Big Ol' Texas Soul
by Memeal
Summary: One night, Duo Maxwell, golden child of the Yuy Business Corporation, disappears. When he returns, everything has changed. One man will save him from his secret. But how can he - when his very presence gives Duo nightmares? AU Slash
1. Chapter One

((_Summary: Duo Maxwell is the golden boy of Yuy Business Solutions. A man of all work, so to speak. He has it all, popularity with his coworkers, beauty, a job tailor made for him, and an active life. But all changes when he disappears. When he returns, secrets are kept, and the echoes of hollow living resound. What happens then, when he must prove himself to the new president of the company, Odin Yuy's son?_

_Disclaimer 1: _

_I do not own Gundam Wing. I merely borrow the character ideas for my own nefarious purposes._

_More Disclaimers following the fic._))

- - - - - - - - -

Big Ol' Texas Soul

"_The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness."_

- John Muir (1838-1914)

Texas, known for its breeding of strong men, tall and beautiful, rangy and willing to die for the love of a woman as good and true as they themselves. Texas, a state pouring out men speaking in a laconic drawl, an easy side long grin, and narrow hips coupled with broad shoulders. Texas, harboring bigness; big peaks, big cities, big plains, big sky, big souls, big hearts.

And Duo Maxwell.

It was a well known fact that every woman on accountant floor C of Yuy Business Corporation, the Payroll section, had been heard to giggle at least once after being called "ma'am" by the slender, light-brown haired, young man. His days then, when he'd first started as an assistant to the head accountant, a simple enough job and one that was a step below that of a secretary in pay, yet had the opportunity for rising into an accounting job, were filled with going to this or that young woman to ask for paper or pencils or where the copier was. It wasn't such a large office, and late night movies between friends laced with wine, led to more than one conversation about how showing the copier to the new boy, could be twisted into all manner of delights. And often a squeal of "But you're married!" did little to chagrin the speaker.

Personnel knew that Duo Maxwell was twenty five when he started. He looked eighteen however. His large golden violet eyes were shot through at various points with something that may have been considered feral even and his Texas grin had all the hints of rakish joy that a boy of eighteen should have when given free reign in an enclosed space filled with seven well adjusted, interested (though not all available) women. Tongues toasted his presence in the firm.

The Yuy Corporation sits in a high rise in the northern states, glittering at the west of the city center, fifty five stories tall not counting the penthouse at the top. Steel and mirror, it seems much like all the other buildings, with a delightful foyer complete with waterfall fountain and statues in the center where sunlight can lance off of the Harbet Office building's facade into the windows and make the silver and white marble interior shine. The difference being that it, alone with two other sky rises in the area, has departments all belonging to the same corporation, rather than various business titles on the black directory in it's aluminum frame set behind the guard's desk. That and the twenty foot letters describing the name of it's familial holder at the edge of the roof, "Yuy."

Yuy Corp., being a large enough company, it may easily be stated that many a man can have lived and died in the building and never been known by any but his secretary, and she only because of the messages she must pass along every morning. Truly, many a face passed through it's doors and was forgotten about before it even managed to hit the sidewalk outside.

But then, being a large business, with so many tongues to wag, it is also just as true a statement to say that there were some who simply could not help but be known by each and every eye, either for their outlandishness (as was the case of Mr. Ireland and his enormous ties and bad comb over and halitosis and disgusting habit of scratching himself whenever he had to wait for the elevator) or for their extreme perfection in dealings like Ms. June who headed the entire payroll almost completely on her own and was so impossible to work with that she rarely kept her assistants more than a month (six and a half weeks being the record - held by someone no one could remember). There were others; the guards were all known because it was good to know your guards and one of the janitors who sang as he mopped was known by face if not by name to all. Everyone knew the bosses, the board of directors were fairly well known, and Missy Rump in the Mail Room was known because besides blessed with a horrible last name, she also was trying to sleep her way up and had so far, in three weeks, managed to move out of delivery and was footing a door open in Receiving.

And after three years, everyone knew Duo Maxwell. And everyone knew that he lived with Ms. Delia Utherwood - manager of the advertising department and one of the board of directors, and that the pair of them were seen always together for the most part. Everyone also knew that Duo was wanted by at least one verbal person with some manner of deviancy on every floor. Duo simply attracted such attentions. He was, in short, incredibly gorgeous. Others managed to be gorgeous, beautiful, handsome, perfect, or some other thing. But Duo was all of these and more. Tall and slender, with a boyish charm and an innocence that was almost too real to be anything close to put-on, he belonged on a front cover of some Vogue magazine or in a Gap commercial with his arms around some slender, gorgeous, model perfect woman like Linda Evangelista.

He also knew half of the city and to go out to lunch with Duo, was to go out with half of the city as well. He was a man who was never alone. Never.  
  
Truly. Never.

Not even at home.

It wasn't that he attracted attention so much as that he was so open to invitation. He was the complete social butterfly to the hilt. He was the ultimate party planner (though never at his apartment, for Ms. Utherwood was a bit less social than he and wanted their home to be her last place of refuge against the large crowds that gathered around her roommate) and every evening was spent out on the town until midnight or one o'clock in the morning. Saturdays he slept in until five in the afternoon, catching up on what he'd missed throughout the week, and then he was back on the remainder of the weekend.

There was no sense of clique about him, anyone nearby was invited and not one person had a bad word to say about the young man (except for Ms. June who never had a nice word to say about anyone - and Missy Rump who had not been able to get him into bed) and it was well known that his favorite words were "The more, the merrier!" Most of the staff of the great building called him "Tex" behind his back and even sometimes to his face. And it was joked at times, that he was the one man welcoming wagon and sunshine committee. No new face got by a week without being introduced to Duo (if for no other reason than for their fellow employees to have someone to sigh to about their sexual frustrations centered around him).

- - - - - - - - -

After three years, he still has a slight Texas drawl in his throat and his smile remains rakish, his polite demeanor is legendary and his backside is the talk of many a cocktail party. He is no longer in the accounting firm as an assistant, but rather is working on projects for second tier upper management in dealing with funds and recovery, a skill he's proven he is as astute at as he is any other task he's given. A golden boy, Duo turns his strength of will and drive to anything he does, not just parties and socializing, but his work as well.

It's a Thursday morning, nine o'clock and Mr. June (the gentleman unfortunate enough to have been married to a Ms. June who still rules over Payroll) looks down at his watch with a slight frown on his face, tapping the bright face before looking back up at the clock on the back wall. His secretary, round and severe, lifts a brow over her dictation notes.

"Late.. never late.." the man mutters to himself as he goes back over his notes and glances at the woman seated across from him. His thin upper lip twitches and accordingly, the mustache there, sparse and holding on for no other reason than it bothers his wife, darts up and down as well. "Mrs. Burnside, would you be so kind as to call down to the check in. We've seem to come up with a missing Mr. Maxwell."

Mrs. Burnside tightens her lips into a severe line and with a quiet nod of assent, slips out of the room, and makes the call while her boss turns in his chair and gazes out of the window, perplexedly rubbing his upper lip with the pad of his thumb. "He's never late.."

The report that there is no check in at the front desk and that there is also no reply at the Maxwell residence does not raise too many eyebrows. It's not that this is a common occurrence for Duo to be late for work, far from it. The man had also proven himself to be inhuman in his timeliness. However, it is not in the main of most human consciousness to consider such anomalies as disasters.

Granted, there is always the possibility that things have gone horribly wrong somewhere. A man laying in a gutter in a pool of his own blood at the bottom of the hairpin turn on Highway 54, a woman murdered in her sleep, a mother with a heart attack on her bathroom floor, a child stolen during the usual run down to the corner store.

Still, in the usual meandering of life from birth toward death, such shifts in the calm burbling of moments, one tumbling over the next, are so rare that they can be classified in the "happening to other people" category. Because even when they've happened, they've happened to other people.

The missing, the dead, they are past it happening to them. It has already happened, in fact. The matter of them being gone is gossip for local coffee shops and church gatherings around the juice and cookie window at the basement get-together after the service. Now and then, someone might mention how their sister is good friends with the brother of that mother, you know, the one of the boy who disappeared. How it is just a shame, but it just goes to show you that you can't be too careful of children and their safety these days.

Only no one really believes that. Because everyone knows that before society, it was things like a falling tree or a shift in the snow drifts or a broken plow.

Tragedy follows the same rules it always has, sudden, unexpected, and always someone else. Because it's a matter of continuing on after. Life just keeps on and leaves behind the person to whom the thing that happens to others had happened to. Mothers have other little ones and they speak in tears years later of their lost child, sisters cry on lover's arms as they are being made love to because their brother won't be there when it is time to tell someone they've found "the one," and men cough uncomfortably as they clean out the locker for their pal who had met with the wrong end of a hydraulic, and they all walk around where the blood had spilled until someone forgets exactly where the blood had spilled and then soon they all forget where things had begun for the one who'd ended there. Because it simply had been a moment, terrible and forming a past story more colorful than it had been before, but it had happened, as it were, to someone else.

So it simply is not a serious issue for anyone that Duo Maxwell has not shown up for work on Thursday morning by nine a.m. There is, of course, some other reason for his being late besides a common place tragedy, as there always is when one's imagination makes up terrible possibilities and we find that in truth it was only a blown tire or a mistaken address or just that the alarm did not go off.

- - - - - - -

Even though it's all in his imagination, for the next hour, Mr. June continues to wrestle with the feeling of unsettled panic. One comes to be aware and comfortable with the patterns of one's employees. Duo was not one of his direct employees, being more of a free lancer within the company's body, yet he had his patterns the same as anyone else. He never broke formation and thus, he should be at work now that it was coming up onto ten.

The possibility that perhaps one of Duo's nights had gone a bit longer than usual and that he might have drunk too much or finally managed to run himself into the ground, does cross Mr. June's mind. Yet it simply does not fit into the schedule of movements in Mr. June's life. Mr. June is a man who needs more consistency than most and he finds he almost always is attracted to those who will fulfill this need of his. His professional contacts, within and without the company, are strewn with the most responsible of figures because everyone knew that Mr. June has enough chaos with the militant insanity Ms. June brings to his life and therefore wants nothing more than no good reason to have to deal with some conflict or another due to someone being late or forgetting a deadline or even simply sleeping in one day.

The chair creaks under Mr. June's weight as he touches on a speaker button near his computer. "Mrs. Burnside, patch me through to the advertising department."

A tinny "Yes sir" responds and as he waits for his phone, he fingers a pile of papers upon which a small neatly noted post-it in neon pink states that it must be done by Friday at 11:30. The Malcron Co. was a secondary client and it is the project that Duo Maxwell is going to be helping with this morning. Duo Maxwell had told Mr. June that things would easily be finished in time given an early enough start on Thursday morning and would eight o'clock be acceptable? Only Duo Maxwell had not come at eight o'clock and the pink note is waiting to be moved to the side and stuck on a memo pad while the papers are gone through, because Duo Maxwell has numbers to add to the documents to make them workable and he has simply not shown up, even though it is past ten in the morning now. A moment after Mrs. Burnside's tinned voice dies off, his phone rings.

Picking up the handset, he leans his forehead on steepled forefinger and thumb and stares at the burnished mahogany surface of his desk, trying not to feel too confused at how his general internal clock has somehow gone haywire. But then, there was Mrs. Burnside and she never went wrong and she was here, as well as his watch and the clock on the wall. It was ten thirty at this point and Duo Maxwell was delinquent by a good many hours with no call in and no polite excuses that even the most hard hearted could forgive. Duo Maxwell had never had to make a polite excuse, for he was always on time. But if he had, Mr. June is fairly certain that he'd have forgiven it, that anyone would have forgiven it. Duo has that way about him and you simply like him too much to hold anything against him.

"Ah, yes, er, Ms. Utherwood please. Hmm, yes, thank you. Ah, no." He turns in his chair once more and stares out over the city landscape. He was only on the forty seventh floor, but it is high enough in this city and he could see the blackened spires of the old Anglican church (it had originally been Catholic but due to some mismanagement of funds in the early 1900's, it was lost and changed hands a good many times - being a health spa at one point, a restaurant at another, and finally retaken over and reinstated as a church twenty years before this), and it was a mighty fine view, if he did say so himself.

"Ms. Utherwood, yes, this is Mr. June in the Technical Instatement department. Yes, please, I do realize that I have not ever spoken to you before, but you see, I had a meeting with your, er, that is to say, I had a meeting planned with Mr. Maxwell and we have, er. - Yes, yes, we've called and there is no reply. I'm so sorry to bother you, but I have never known Mr. Maxwell to be late before and seeing as how he is your, er, yes, well. – "

Mr. June twirls his pen over his fingers as he speaks, remarking to himself somewhere that Ms. Utherwood has a pleasant voice and how it is decidedly different from that of his own wife. He hasn't managed to see anything other than a picture of Ms. Utherwood on the wall downstairs where the Board is behind oak frames on display to various interested public and employees, and how her voice fits her face. According to the picture on the wall downstairs, she was a comfortable sort of woman, with an ease that made any man wish he knew her better. Her eyes were an icy stormy sort of blue and she wore (in the picture downstairs) blue eye shadow which on any other woman would look tacky, but managed to look fairly beautiful on her. She was one of those pretty ones who didn't look like she'd be disagreeable or easy to hate unless you had some deep seated anger against beautiful, talented, and easy going women, which he did not. If anything, it was the opposite.

A moment after, calls made to Ms. Utherwood and to the guards at the front desk, Mr. June has come to a sufficient state of alarm to seriously consider putting in a missing persons report. But he is aware of the time distinction that an hour or two of missing work cannot substantiate the means of such a move and instead, he goes up to Advertising and meets with Ms. Utherwood (who insists on being called Delia and smiles and takes his hand in a firm but not too firm handshake) and the pair drive off to check her home as well as using both of their cell phones to call the various peoples they think might be most likely to have met with Duo the night before.

Three hours later, it being a quarter of two, they pull back up before the office and stare at one another in confusion. The car idling and the smell of hot leather seats, the faint scent of perfumed skin, and the rustle of the aspen trio sitting sidelong against the building's front, beside the tumbling waterfall set in amongst two flights of stairs heading upwards to the main entrance. Somehow, what might have been a moment of almost peace in a pair of lives that held so little of it, is marred by the sick feeling both sense at the base of their souls.

"I can't imagine it." Mr. June rubs his palm back and forth along his balding pate as he shakes his head slightly in confusion; this was that moment someone else was supposed to be living, not him. "Can you think of anyone else to call? We've tried the mailing floor room. And Marty says that he left the SexnKitten," Mr. June still finds it difficult to believe that anyone would have managed to get that name past the decency committee they must have somewhere on the planning board, "at eleven last night. He should have been home not more than eleven thirty even if he did have car difficulties."

Delia's blue eyes have a watery mist that only makes their color more alive and alluring as she clenches her hands together over her knees. "But I was up until midnight working on the Franklin Myers case and he hadn't made it home by that time. I would have seen him." She seems lost for a moment as she stares out of the window before turning to gaze at Mr. June and opening her mouth, thinking again over it and taking a breath.

"Doesn't he, er, tell you, ah, that is, where..." Mr. June flushes.

"Duo and I are not an item, Mr. June," and Ms. Utherwood manages to seem almost prim rather than agitated at the idea. "But still, he has not had room for a relationship from the first I've known him. He is very dedicated to his work, you see. He simply has never seen the reason for anything beyond his work and his, what he calls - I-I keep wondering if I - should be - you see, it's the present tense of -" She stops and clamps her jaw closed, dropping her head as she struggles to regain control of herself.

Mr. June clears his throat and rubs a finger over his minuscule mustache, narrowing his eyes down at the steering wheel and how it cuts the view of the asphalt parkway into two shining black halves. In desperation, he coughs out, "Yes, well - anyone else? We may have missed some lead, somewhere. There simply must be a reason, you see. We cannot give up hope just yet." Mr. June tries at times of stress to ferret out of his imagination the images of an English detective or gentleman from the various PBS specials he's seen on the television since he was a young man, it's become a habit and for a moment, he feels almost outside of his body, alongside the problem rather than deep in it's clutches, and the relief is formidable, considering what may be coming.

Delia crinkles her brow (a rather cute gesture, Mr. June thinks - very unlike Ms. June's habit of turning her face into a series of lines, all which point to how incompetent you have just managed to prove yourself to be in whatever you recently said or did) and tucks her arms around her small body. "No - I have tried everyone. I really can't think of who else might know." Her blue eyes fill up with tears and Mr. June pats her hand awkwardly, never one comfortable with physical touch.

"I - I suppose we should - should consider checking - oh I can't even say it!" she sobs in horror, finally overcome if even for that specific moment, soon to be over. She won't put words to the fears. But Mr. June knows what she means because it was only logical that they begin to consider the worst now.

- - - - - -

And so they do. Check the hospitals that is. Boundary County General had three John Doe's that previous evening and two of those were dead, but only one had light brown hair and he was forty five and a man known to the staff as a local hobo who came every summer from Mississippi. Harborview was much the same, though there were no deaths out of the five, yet none young enough and one too young at sixteen - and that young man had a mohawk.

Twenty four hours later, they and a great many friends who have all come to stay at Ms. Utherwood's apartment for support, have called the police department and filed the report with the desk sergeant and now mill about, drinking coffee and whispering low to one another or cry softly as the weight of tragedy wrings another burst of pressure out of them, each a bent pipe in a long, confusing mess of machinery of grief. They lean against walls waiting to be inserted into the works or quietly hiss into cell phones and to one another, whispers of sad steam. Some sit out on the verandah and stare into the grassy lawn and the small pond out back, reflecting the black hulk of building before it.

Ms. June demands that her husband return home and with a hang-dog expression speaking volumes to Delia Utherwood, he kisses the slim hand that fits neatly in his own, and makes his leave as the best of Englishmen have ever done, despite the fact that he's really originally from Minnesota.

The door closing behind him shuts out the sounds of voices, hushed and loud, but all free. Still, there are shackles of every kind on every life that was ever lived and that his wife might control much of his movement on the planet does not mean that there could not have been far worse ways to go.

Mr. June's bucket seats crinkle loudly in protest in the hot summer evening air. There is too much herbicide on the perfect lawns in this upscale apartment housing complex to give crickets a place where they might sing without choking on fumes, so that other than the faint passing hiss of a car out on the road which cross before the wall of rhododendron hedge which encases the perfect lawn, nothing makes sound and the leather can say it's complaint quite clearly.

It really is strange, Mr. June considers, how living becomes so much more sharply inlaid against a backdrop of terrible things such as loss and uncertainty. It almost leaves him wishing that he were home at this very moment. Ms. June notwithstanding, he is fond of his quiet den and it's old faux fur chair, what he calls his "bear chair." A great, old eighties form recliner with acrylic fuzzy, and worn fabric, brown as pine pitch, he'd received it some years before when his father had passed away. He wasn't exactly certain if it were the same chair it had been when he was a child. He did think it possible his mother might have refinished it but in the same fabric because his father had been fond of how it had felt like a great soft cushion, and had made the comment more than often, that he felt like Romulus or Remus, though it didn't matter which, for either way, he slept on the warm side of a passing animal.

Mr. June had never wondered why his father had slept so often in the chair and so little in his own bed. But then, now he found that he went to the softness of the chair after a particularly painful bout against the hard lines of Ms. June's tongue now and again. Maybe, he thought, he'd have to reupholster the chair in the same fabric himself, that is, if Ms. June didn't have the chair removed during one of his bi-yearly business trips. She had a habit of rearranging his universe when he left for a few days so that it fit more in her view of what the universe of a man in her life should be.

The tires of the convertible crinkle asphalt in a long rolling purr down the steep driveway, past the wall of rhodies and out onto the street. Mr. June shifts into gear and in a fit of adolescent joy brought on by memory of a small hand fitting his and the lifting of a weight of tragedy that must no longer be in his realm, but which remained far behind him, in that room of whispers and vague trilling cell phones, lets his engine catch and shove him back into the seat as he leaps onto the street and back toward downtown to catch 7-North to Hisleton.

- - - - - - -

Sgt. Blake finds the body and makes the call. There is the identification of course. And the body has been fairly beaten to nothing considering that it had fallen into an open sewer manhole and fallen deep into it about three days before. But it has a Slate Watch with the name "D. M." etched on the back and while the sewer rats had done a number or two on the face, they also took note of the half drenched parking pass to Yuy Corp. underground parking, Lot 48B in the wallet found nearby.

Of course, to be sure, they put the body in the morgue and call Ms. Utherwood, as she is the only contact they know of for Duo Maxwell. There is nothing to recognize, but the watch and the parking badge and the wallet are enough. It has been six days and with the watch in her hand, the letters etched on the back blurring into a silver smear in her eyes, she is fully alone.

An acquaintance of Duo's had come to her aid, a woman with a particularly take charge attitude and a good eye for networking of names and faces. Named Maria, she fits the name well, black hair and black eyes and a sharp voice even though she fills all the curves of her body like a hand in a kid glove, hot, warm, and delicious to the touch.

Delia doesn't want her near. The enforced perfection in Maria - in the face of the silver blur in Delia's palm, cannot fit this world. Maria will never have red eyes as fat as melons, with a mouth smeared across because grief drags down the right hand corner and twists it under. It's been days, and Delia can't seem to recognize a bar of soap long enough to do more than use it minimally. There is the soft scent of vanilla on her forearms, but her hands smell like the iron on the watch. The hall clock ticks and Maria put a cup of coffee beside her arm before leaving as effectively as she had come in the beginning. And without a single note of sad music which she always has needed before, Delia bends forward, tucking her nose in against her left knee so hard that it feels as if might bruise the cartilage underneath the freckled skin, and in rolling hitches, begins to silently scream her cries into her CC jeans.

- - - - - - -

At the morgue, Dr. Sande frowns, staring at x-rays and reaches for a phone.

- - - - - - -

Down at the corner of 8th and Ash, in the Ides Tavern, Andrew Pollich drinks another pint with a twenty he'd "bummed" off of his pal a week before and he makes a loud toast to "th'fugger Hiram who'sh fuggin' m'gurl 'gin.. fugyer awl," as his girl tugs on his arm and hisses for him to watch who he tells it all to.

- - - - - - -

Speakeasy Sue, finishes her nightly routine on the stage at the SexnKitten and begins to work on the fake breasts that hang off of her chest, peering down and wondering if she should pluck her chest again and makes a note to talk to her therapist about it, would that mean she's less of a woman if she is sick of plucking her chest after six months of plucking and would the hormones make the hair stop growing? She tucks her slender body into a dressing robe so that friends and fans can come in to bring flowers, and she wonders why Jimmy hasn't shown up to try and make things good between them again and if Jimmy was off sleeping with some tramp that he'd picked up in an alley or some other hole just to get back at her.

- - - - - - -

And Delia is roused at two a.m. by a dull knock on her front door. She stands, tear free, every liquid in her body wrung from every cell, and with the watch held in gently curved fingers - opens the door.

Heat enters the air conditioned ground floor apartment door, the cement is wet with something dark, heated and flushing the white with red, and Delia grips the door frame and does a moment's spinning in her mind until the shoulders that are bent before her make sense and the blood turns into regular shadows and a single tawny and violet eye stares up at her from under an old bruise and a violently tended mouth gasps. Her nails are pushed into their beds when she clenches her hands and the witching hour comes upon her too hard and she runs through her own head, wondering if she's only dreaming and that if she is, than it's the cruelest of dreams. One is supposed to have dreams of a smiling face, light flowing around hair, angelic music filling the ears and that laughing voice saying that everything will be okay. Not this nightmare.

But the gasp is too real and she sobs, discovering wells she'd not tapped yet as the watch falls to the concrete and the face shatters and she catches him as he stumbles in against her. The thick press of a body against hers cuts her tongue loose from it's moorings and keening, she screams out, "Tex!!!!" and pulls him so close that he screams and passes out when she tugs too hard on a dislocated shoulder.

- - - - - - -

The memories of that evening are too muddled. The body in the sewer had shown no sign of trauma but for the fall, an accidental death. Six weeks later it is identified as that of James Hynde, a local transvestite singer at the SexnKitten singing under the stage name, Helen of Trojans.

On that score, Duo Maxwell will not add. He had, yes, known Jimmy Hynde, some years before. They had gone to school together and knew one another vaguely. Yes he'd seen the man the night of his death. But he'd left for home and next thing he'd known, he'd woken up some miles outside of town in a basement of one of the new developments. He wasn't sure where it was, he hadn't been so sure of where he'd been, dammit. And yes, he'd woken up in the state he was in when he'd arrived, albeit, less dirty.  
  
Or more, if one were to say. Dr. Jill Norris had her concept of what he might have been covered in, but she keeps quiet on the matter. It's consideration, confidentiality. It is why the PD chooses her for such cases, because she's got a mind like an iron trap and a mouth much the same. Without the permission of her patient, she'll say nothing. Duo Maxwell does not give permission and beyond basics required by law, the rest is buried deeply in the memory of the man and his physician.

Jill is a slender woman, because she jogs four miles every morning, a quick work out, and only to keep her in shape for the weekends when she does cross country afternoons on the hoof, as she calls it.

Her fingers belie her body type, short and deft, with stubbed ends, they are a farmer's wife's hands. The hands of her German grandmother, intended for shucking corn and peas, milking cows and tending fields, a man's hands. But they worked just fine in Germany at tending the cows and six children and they work just fine in the city's Harborview Municipal Hospital.

She finds pride in having made it as far as she has on farmer's hands, Germanic or otherwise. And she uses them with a comfortable sort of blindness to humanity and it's needs or wants. She had learned quickly in her practice that hands too aware of where they were, only managed to make people tense.

She is a mechanic, looking over a body as if it were machine. But like any mechanic, she has her soft spots and she does her best to keep too much tenderness from touching Duo Maxwell's skin, because she has a job to do, even as she would have loved to stroke away the bruises marring skin that should never have been marred. Needle pierces and thread follows, pain pills are administered, an optometrist referred for the left eye which seems to have difficulty due to optical swelling. MRI's and CAT scans, x-rays and hushed conversations behind closed doors, and she keeps her fingers still because Duo Maxwell is a man who will leap ten feet sideways if he knew you were seeing him as anything more than a machine. He feels like a machine and it shows in every movement he makes.

Jill worries though and when the pain meds are finished and the antibiotic course has been thoroughly finished, the stitches are well on their way to being taken out and no sign of seepage or concerns on the broken ribs and cracked tibia, she sits Mr. Maxwell down for a talk about other types of medication.

He isn't so very certain that he needs Prozac or any of it's sisters, but he promises to take her opinion to bed with him to consider, he states with that half broken Texas drawl of his and the prescription is in his hand as he leaves.

Delia picks him up in his old VW bus and she touches him so carefully that it makes his skin crawl. He hasn't the heart to speak, afraid that he'll say something unreasonable and angry so he keeps his mouth shut on the drive home, pretending to fall asleep against the bumping window and his headache gets only worse. He's careful to wake when they arrive so she needn't touch him to wake him; the sudden jerk of her unfamiliar foot on the brake is reason enough for it not to seem too contrived, but he suspects she knows.

Duo won't look in the mirror in his bathroom, the marred, black and blue and red face mottled and broken by the line of stitches under his left eye yet to come out, still leave him feeling sick to his stomach when he turns, expecting to see and recognize himself and finds instead a distant monstrous face gazing back at him. Jill had told him that the scars might be there months, but the bruising was bound to be gone in a couple weeks. It had been a week already, and they were a light purple still, like plums too ripe so that they'd be squishy and dull to taste.

He leaves the prescription on top of the toilet's water tank and lays down to sleep. The blankets lay on him heavily so he leaves only his sheets, the lights off of the lamp have to shine in every dark corner, the door is wide open, his toe is numb. And the sheets hurt his face.

- - - - - - - -

The elevator opens on the TI floor and Mr. June taps his pen against his thumb, stepping out into the white and blue waxed tile hall. His offices are the last on the right, the lettering there stating it to be the offices of Mr. Matthew June in precise white print, words spaced apart by a one and three quarter inch. It is frosted glass, so thick that the only certain color to bleed through is the navy of the Turkish rug on the interior floor. The rest filters one into the other in a "miasma of rainbows", in Delia's often poetic words.

Mr. June is two minutes early, close enough to on time to count in his book, and Mr. Maxwell waits for him, speaking softly to Mrs. Burnside, a conversation that he halts when Mr. June closes the door behind him.

"Ah, Duo.." Mr. June holds out his hand. Mr. June has managed to come to know Duo fairly well on a social scale, now that Ms. June has left him and filed for divorce based on irreconcilable differences, and after his friendship has taken a more firm hold with Ms. Utherwood. Still, the light haired young man seems to always be about nine degrees off of real and the golden blue eye that meet his own muddy brown has about as much friendliness in them that a visiting cat's might.

Duo's handshake is perfect, as much of the rest of the young man is. Dressed to the nines in a silk suit of dark navy and a magenta power tie, he moves as gracefully as a dancer, using each iota of space he takes up. His light chestnut hair which had been to his shoulder blades a year before, is now to the middle of his back, yet newly formed bangs are allowed to fall in his eyes and to cover the black patch that rests over his right eye. It was, Duo had explained to him, because of the surgery they'd had to do on his left. There simply was too much damage and for the next few months, he'd be required to force his left eye to take on much of the work to prevent a forever straying eye, to strengthen the muscle there. At night, Duo took off the patch and for a few hours, he read with both, stopping only when his headaches grew too great and he was tired of seeing double.

Duo had changed. He was even more famous if such a thing were possible, due to his changes. Many heard of his mysterious disappearance that evening over a year before. But the exact details were lost, Delia proving to be as tightlipped as the police and Dr. Jill Norris. Yet the eye patch served to make him all the more a mystery and his shift without being a shift, was much of a buzz when touched upon over drinks at the water cooler. "Tex" had not been a man for much but home bodying the first few months. That was to be expected due to his needing to recuperate. But it hadn't lasted. Quickly he'd made his way back into his old, comfortable social circles. And he'd managed to remain just as wild if but a bit desperate in his grasping for society. He remained perfect upon his job, yet the nights got longer, mornings more difficult, and the young man was known to show wear now and then, more often on Friday mornings and Mondays. He'd become human - most simply accepted that Duo was no longer a party machine, but a man who loved the party. But one smile and memories flooded back in and the fey like qualities that made him magic, mix with the now tragic component that undulates within his hidden need for something that everyone wanted desperately to fulfill, to discover.

- - - - - - - -

Delia leaves her bedroom door open and leans back in her office chair, staring at the numbers which refuse to crunch. Far behind her are the things that happen to other people, she is immersed again in her work, her exercise regimen at the local health club (Gaylord's Spa - a local joke. But G. Kinning was an old friend of hers and she loved the air of the place; its eighties music, the quiet grunting of men in tight spandex as they lift before mirrors, and the fact that the vast majority of them won't look at her twice - too busy looking at one another), and the day to day work of living.

The fan alongside her spins in a soft whirring and lifts the hairs at the nape of her neck, those few tendrils that have managed to stay free of the clip holding all the rest upon the top of her head. A soft Handel piece plays on her CD drive, swinging violins followed close behind by the heavier, bumbling cello lovers. It was enough to engage but not enough to draw her attention away from the spreadsheet she now wrestled with.

"Whoever made spread sheets should be drawn and quartered," the mild rolling voice interrupts her thoughts.

She leans back and cracks her neck, resting her right palm on the side of her neck with a groan, rewarded a moment after by warm fingers kneading the soreness in her shoulders. "I think they have been.." she grins.

"Well, we'll have to reanimate them and kill them again," Duo asserts behind her and when she leans her head back, she can feel his chuckle wrinkle the granite like plane of his abdomen and nudge her own skull with the humorless laugh.

"Mmm... you think?" she stretches her arms above her head, tucking them through the holes between his elbows and his body and looks back and up at him. He's staring at the screen and his face is hard. She realizes now, as she has again and again, how Duo changed when he returned from wherever he'd been lost in during that week. For the most part, it's easy to forget the horrors of what placed that scar on his left eye, just to the corner. Dr. Norris had done a fabulous job and the scar is almost unnoticeable anymore. You have to know it's there. But like Jill has said time and time again, it's the internal scarring that they'd have to watch out for.  
  
Delia holds to his arms and he gives a look of brief annoyance, a flash of something that had never been there before, then lapses into a small grin, though the smile never reaches his eyes anymore. She lets her hands slide, knowing she's pushing again. Duo doesn't want anyone hanging on him. He never had before, but it was more like a child hating being told what to do, where now it seemed almost feral in a way, anger ready to lash out on anyone holding him too close. She guesses at this; not having seen Duo ever angry, only those brief lapses in his usual happy demeanor.

"I suppose," he murmurs and then leans down, his side brushing her shoulder as he taps a few buttons, changes a sequence and nods. "There."

Shifting her focus to the spreadsheet, she arches a brow in surprise. "Thanks."  
  
"No problem. You going out t'night?" He straightens and rubs his upper arm.

"How did you do that?" She laughs.

"Do what? Oh, just common mistake. I do it all the time. Now, you wanna go out t'night or are you gonna stay home? Is Junie-baby coming over?" he locks his slender legs one over the other and leans on her desktop, a mischievous smile turning him from smoldering volcanic god to Puck, complete with how his brown hair is tangled over his ears and encircles his crown, careening to the side in a braid which catches at his shoulder before bursting down his back in a long shiny line of autumnal beauty.

"He hates it when you call him that," but she has the grace to blush and does so, with aplomb. "And yes, Matthew will be coming over. He and I are going to, er, you know I haven't talked to you about this yet." She creases her brow as is her wont.

He jerks with the smirk that erupts from him on the tails of the brief choked laugh. "Yeah?"

Her blush deepens. "Oh no!" eyes wide with shock, she laughs in both shock and embarrassment. "Not that. I mean, we're waiting and all. He's old fashioned and I guess so am I. No, I mean - damn, I'd wanted to -"

"Never is the right time to break it off, Delia," his long slow drawl lingering a bit longer on his laconic grin as he smoothly interrupts her.

It wasn't that she didn't want him around any more. Or it was. Maybe they both knew it. Having Duo as a roommate was just not what others thought it to be. He was rarely home, and when he did manage to stay home for more than a half hour, he stalked from room to room in silence, pacing like a cat caught in a hot tin box, aware that it was going to suffocate and waiting for the top to open so it can scrabble out. He rarely sat to read like he'd been accustomed to doing; he slept, ate on the run, and sometimes didn't come home at night at all. There was some talk, and being his roommate Delia had been privy to it, that he was starting to sleep his way through the women, trying to find the right one. In a way, she believed it. And she'd checked with him that last October, rubbing her fingers on her neck because it was where Mr. June had put his first kiss beyond her mouth just two days before.

"You've been out a lot, lately," she'd asked, not wanting to pry, because he was southern and she thought that the southern gentlemen might not like prying so much as the more brash northerners.

"Hm?" his hands were moving all the time nowadays, and this time they'd been strangling a small necklace that he'd been playing with on his wrist, gold with intimate links so small and close that they seemed to be one single strand.

She tried again, "I mean, that I'm wondering if we should have the talk, you know. The one roomies have when they're starting to have ... girlfriends and stuff?" there, that hadn't been too prying, but she was definitely fishing.

His laughter was a surprise, short, quick, and overwhelming as if she'd said something almost too funny. "Delia, honey.." he'd rarely called her honey since he returned, but it made her feel happy to hear it again - as if maybe he was beginning to heal inside, even though the prescription still sat on the toilet tank cover with neither of them willing to move it, "you know that if I get any girl besides you, you'll be the first to know, okay?" his warm hand with the gold chain feeling the same temperature as his skin, covered her hand and his cat's eye studied her, too far away inside to be there, as if he was always seeing more than what was placed before him.

She hadn't asked much more, and the rumors continued. Plenty of women want to have slept with Duo Maxwell, so the possibilities are fairly endless as to whether they are real or not, even. But in the way of rumor mills when it comes to a man as engaging and mysterious as Duo, things just have their own life. And while he's far too good looking and more than friendly enough to offset anything negative, a reputation is begun to fit his heel to toe, hip rolled walk through the building. Simply stated, girls are best with their hearts tucked under their seats where they can't be found, touched, or broken by the indomitable Duo Maxwell's loving touch.

And that kind of reputation is going to almost rub off on his roomie. She was getting tired of the questions about him, his habits, how available, if they were together or not. Things were hard enough on Matthew with the divorce without having to deal with his girlfriend being Duo Maxwell's personal sex slave.

It really was amazing how one sided folks could be. It didn't change how Duo was utilized in the company. If anything, it made him more known and because his work was impeccable, his manners a joy, and his looks enough to make most human libidos to go crazy, he was in more demand than before. It was, he said, something he enjoyed.

"So he's gonna move in?" Duo's words interrupt her thoughts.

"Hmm? Oh yes, yes, I'm sorry. He is. Or, we're, ah, we're talking about it." Her smile feels forced.

Duo purses his lips tightly together and nods in deep thought, staring down at the wastebasket by his foot. After a moment or two of her watching him, he flicks his eyes back to hers and gives a half grin, "Well, you know what they say about three being a crowd and all. When're you guys talking about it?"

"Oh, we don't want you to move out. Not - "she balks.

"...yet," he finishes for her. "Yeah, that's okay. We'll take it one step at a time, okay? I'll help him move in when he gets here, but I'll keep an eye scoped out for a new place. Sound fair?" And he's so calm that she visibly relaxes. What had she expected? For him to go berserk, angry that she was leaving him? Because she wasn't leaving him. Things had simply come to an end.

She nods and closes her eyes when he leans down, kissing her temple. "I'm going to make some calls. I'll come back and tell you where I'm going and if you and Junie-baby wanna come, you're welcome to." He checks in now before going anywhere; a small safeguard for himself, something he'd adopted all on his own. She acts like an anchor or a parent for him to hide behind, though he did it subtly and it had been months before she'd realized what he was doing.

She'd have to wait to talk to him about the other stuff. It wasn't time yet. "Thanks, Tex."

"Your welcome, ma'am." She can hear him shuffling off and a short time later, the rocking joyful voice that hides the desperation she thinks only she can hear, calling out, "Hey man! What's up for t'night, huh?"

- - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - -

It wasn't until October when he left, got himself an apartment down on the south side of town, complete with jet tub and an island in the kitchen. Southside places went for enough but weren't so expensive that he'd be strapped for the place, having to put in any extra hours. Not like he wasn't already putting in a damned sixty hour week as it is. Between weekends and holidays, he was making sure that the company couldn't work without him.

He knew everyone by name now except for the newest members and he was getting calls from the higher ups surrounding Delia's position, which meant that in order to keep up with the demands, he had to work at home as well. It was severely cramping his night life, actually.

But then, he didn't mind the loss of the nightlife. That wasn't leading him anywhere but down. He still went out three, four nights a week, just not every night and he was back to coming home at the better, earlier hours. He knew that Delia was happy for that. He'd even taken on a roomie about five months before, a guy by the name of Burnside. Tate Burnside, and Duo called him Burnie for lack of a better name, because he hated the name Tate. The man was tall, content in his own skin, kinda like an old hippy sorta guy, and he was too busy working as well to be interested in much else. All of which makes life a lot easier on Duo because that way the directions his life has been taking can go fairly unnoticed.

It's not like he has time to develop a fucking drinking problem or anything. Not like he's got days to sit around scratching his ass with a swizzle stick. But if he didn't know any better, he'd say he was on a definite path to something that was taking him into some kind of personal hell. It wasn't the times when he was out, nor the times when he was working. It didn't bother him when Burnie was around or when the girls were over, or guys for that matter. Not that he ever slept with any one of them. But he'd managed a good necking session now and again, enough to stave off the hunger that had no respect for what he really needed.  
  
Instead, it was the times when he was walking to his car, before he can slip inside and slam his fist against the stereo controls and fill his brain with a tsunami of sound from his sound system. It's the times when he is just about to fall asleep and the darkness is filled with something mildly menacing, hovering over him and pressing him deep down into sleep and nightmares.

The nightmares are the worst of course. He has them at least twice, maybe more, times a week. But he had been careful to get an apartment with rooms at opposite sides of the place from one another. And then, add to that the habit he has of locking his door. Everything is locked when he goes to sleep, no bright, fresh air in his house. It's battened down, ready for the next storm that might buffet against the sails of his tortured soul. And he's damn good at hiding his sobbing breaths into the pillow that he bites every night when he wakes, a muffled scream and his body convulsing, sometimes even coming on his sheets. Seriously flaming freaky shit wet dreams, things that leave him only more and more tarnished as the time goes on.

Still, he drinks enough and there's often times a bottle by the bedside. See, when he goes to bed drunk, he doesn't wake up when the nightmares come. They still do arrive, if you go by the state of his bed in the morning every now and then. And the alcohol is better than sleeping pills. You just wake with a treacherous headache in the morning and this way, he isn't having to stuff some more shit down his gullet just to fucking wake up.

So yeah, he needs a drink now and then, but he doesn't go out drinking himself into oblivion and it's only after a really bad night that he wakes up with cotton mouth and feeling like shit. Usually it's nothing that a few aspirin can't handle.

He doesn't see Delia so much anymore and when, three months later, Burnie plays the shit-for-friend and turns him in, she's not so surprised and she goes to see him.

- - - - - - - -

The center is painted blue and white and it has fake plants at the corners of each light sky blue couch. Magazines litter the waiting room and she stands, with the Vogue clutched in a roll in her hands as he enters, his face wane and his eyes shadowed, even though he smiles at her. He's in a ragged old robe, a worn-out midnight black and something she knew he loved, old and ugly as it is. It was one of those things, he said, that you just wore so long that your skin didn't know what to do when it didn't have the thing around itself. You had to indulge skin sometimes. And maybe because his skin wasn't indulged in any other way. Or maybe because his skin was the only thing that could be indulged. His feet shuffle in slippers that look new and she knows that Burnie had picked them up for him.

She smiles uncertainly. "Hey.." and kisses his cheek, leaning in, her hand on his forearm.

"Junie-baby know about this?" he frowns, but leans forward to take her kiss.

"Of course, I can't keep this secret from him," she winces at the look of hardness that covers his face. "Look, he is just as worried and Burnie and me. We didn't know that it was getting so bad, Duo.."

"Yeah, well, things just get out of hand sometimes, don't they?" he mutters, running his hand through his hair in a restless gesture, unbound down his back. "So, you brought me the ho's?" his grin is infectious. She ignores the way the joke covers other sins.

After producing the ho-hos in their silver wrappings from her coat pocket, the two of them walk out of the recovery center and wander onto the lawn outside, trying to find a place where there aren't others visiting their loved ones or just steeping themselves in their own misery. He looks around as he takes a cake from her, half unwrapped, the silver wrapping brandishing sunlight like a sword, "I hate this place. Look at all these fucking bastards. Pity party galore. You should hear the shit they talk about. It's all fucking hug me and be there for me shit." But he doesn't sound angry, only worn terribly down. "They want me to talk about what happened, Delia." He grimaces. "You know I can't do that. They say it's the only way I'll learn why I'm drinking so fucking much. But I told them, or I told him - you know my shrink's a guy? His name is John Thomas." He grins and she laughs. "John Fucking Thomas.. I asked him if he wanked more than most of us or if his parents just got off after naming him after his fucking dad."  
  
Delia rubs her arms, and he watches her, knowing she's uncomfortable with the pain he's throwing out over her, like some glittering net. He sighs, "Anyway... thanks for these," and he lifts up the cake and takes a bite out of it, lapsing into the depths of the uncomfortable silence she brings with her.

"We're getting the junior Mr. Yuy in from Japan," she mentions casually, wanting the conversation to turn. "He's been working for a few years in their offshore company. I don't think you've met him, yet."

"Nah.." he shrugs, using his index finger to scoop out the filling and sucking it off with what cannot be called relish in any way. More of an automatic gesture than anything.

"Well" she endeavors to continue, "He's got some new ideas about what to do. I think it'll be good to have him there. I already told him that you were on sick leave and that he should contact you when you get back. I said you have some good ideas in the field of computers and the design department has been after you for months to get your input on things. He's intrigued because you are sort of an ambiguous figure in his company. You know how you don't really have a job title. It makes you famous, there really aren't many men who can do what you do - "she finds herself dying off as her friend doesn't make a sound. "Anyway, he - uh, has said that he'll see you when you get back."

He turns his head, looking sidelong at her, his hair falling into his eyes and his face looking far too young to be going through a thirty day program, surrounded by aging accountants and middle aged housewives on various banks of green or flower seats scattered around them in the park like lawn. His smile is soft, but distant. He shrugs. "Sounds good," he sighs and she knows he doesn't believe her, knows that his reputation is shot at the business, and that maybe he doesn't even care about that.

- - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - -

The full spectrum lighting and the water's clear bell like sound across his skin makes him want to turn around and crawl back out of the foyer. He blinks for a moment, staring at the guard station, at the man standing behind it. Is he even ready for this?

"Duo? Or, Mr. Maxwell!" the guard beams and walks around from behind his desk. "It's sure nice to see you again sir. You look like hell." The greeting isn't customary but it gives Duo a bit of a jolt and he laughs.

"Fucking right, feel like it too, Joe," he nods to the big man and takes the large hand held out to him. "Nice to be back. You held up that wall back there all this time? Strong man, strong man. The whole place would go down without you."

"Yessir, I suspect it would. Would you like me to get your elevator for you sir? I hear you're meeting with Mr. June today."

"I've heard the same, Joe. Hope neither of us is wrong or I'm up Shit Creek without m'paddle ya know?" he grins and accepts the offer for the elevator.

'Junie Baby' manages to act almost normal, considering that he knows the guy standing in front of him just came back from a thirty day rehab and some change. If you consider the week he used in getting in, and the week it took to get adjusted to being out.

Yeah, Duo's got his fuck buddy.. or rather, the guy he has to call when he gets those urges, and the guy doesn't like him much. Hates him, more like. So Duo hasn't called him once, but has used Burnie until the poor hippy kid is all but worn out from the emotional strain. Still, the guy keeps trucking on. You gotta love guys like Burnie, all wanting to do the right thing and shit.

But Matthew smiles and holds out his hand and he only watches Duo worriedly when he's not sure Duo can see him. So he manages only to get caught a time or two. Only Duo waves and smiles like he doesn't care or doesn't know. It's the brave face thing that he's good at. He's smiling for everyone and after a few more weeks, he is even smiling for Burnie. So that Burnie doesn't know that he's getting those urges back.

No, not those urges. The other ones. The ones that got him into this shit to begin with. In with Jimmy and ... and ...  
  
So! Fuck that. He mentally shrugs himself to life. Listening to the elevator close behind him, he slumps to the side.

He leans his head against the hallway wall and closes his eyes, taking deep breaths. "Don't fuck this up, Maxwell," he mutters to himself. Snapping his lids open, he stares at the expanse of white so close and wonders that if he stares at it long enough, will it become real and he'll just fall into emptiness. Because the last thing he wants to do is walk into that fifty-fourth story office and confront his new boss.

Mr. Yuy must know everything. Of course Delia has told everyone. He can tell from the way they look.

And so yeah. This is where he has to suck up and smile again and act like he's got all his shit together again, when he's barely holding it together. But his mask isn't slipping so that's good. He's got a will of steel, not one to move mountains, but pretty fucking close.

Of course, she's not told anyone and really, she's moved mountains herself, keeping it out of his employee records. He's logged in as health issues which covers the problem with the bags under his eyes some days or his sudden fits of odd temper that he's now becoming a different sort of famous for. Like the day last week he had walked into an advertising meeting with a black shirt, skin tight, emblazoned with the words "Atomic Beaver In Tow" in silver lettering, under a black blazer opened so all could see it. They had gotten the contract and while there had been some serious frowning at his suddenly very unconventional means of making himself known and remembered, no one had been able to say a word against him, because he'd succeeded. It was in those times when he'd shown himself to really shine.  
  
He walked in jeans now, everywhere, defying the dress code and he still got the jobs, still managed to make things work for whomever asked him to work for them. And he smiles and flirts more than he ever had before. Or if not more, than certainly deeper. A day meeting Duo in the elevator is a day filled with a permanent blush. The man was, by all reports, insatiable, unspeakable, and completely without decorum.

It was wonderful. For most of the pretty faces around anyway. Some frowned, but most simply swooned.

And here he is, Mr. Cool, Mr. I-got-it-covered, Mr. Fuckem'all, staring at the white wall and hoping that he'll get through this in one piece.

He straightens, finds his mask, fits it firmly onto his face where his smile can be like a mega watt light bulb, all readiness to work, and his eyes dancing, and pushes the door handle, entering into the outer office. Shit, even the secretary has a window!

Checked in and comfortable on the two seater leather couch, he makes idle and comfortable chitchat with the secretary, seeming not to notice her blush and the way she looks him over because he just looks so ... nice... in those jeans and that silk suit coat, white linen shirt with the dark blue tie. Good enough to eat. But that's Duo for ya. He puts in a lot of effort to keep up those damned appearances.  
  
The buzzer rings on her desk and she gives an apologetic smile to the handsome young man leaning on his elbow. Picking up the phone she goes about talking to the person on the other line. All the while, watching the man from, behind, as he stands and wanders the room, taking stock of the pictures, his file folder held firmly in one long, artist's hand and his long golden chocolate braid swaying at his back.

He's simply waiting. A few minutes early, cool as a cucumber, for his meeting with the new Mr. Yuy from Japan, to meet with him.

- - - - - - -

((_Hello everyone! Time for another. Other than warnings for individual chapters, I think I shall keep author's comments to the end of fics (feel free to kick me if I do otherwise) on these next ones. _

_Disclaimer 2: _

_This fic is not likely to be a high priority in the updating department. Please be patient with me! _

_Disclaimer 3: _

_Yaoi/Slash. This means male-male relations/romance. Please do not read if this offends you or you think it may offend you. _

_**Public Thank-You**:_

_To Trace, for all of her hard work and her amazingly swift grammatical mind, so unlike my own. Thank you thank you thank you! _

_Feel free to let me know what you think about it! Constructive criticism is welcome. Actually, any criticism is welcome._))


	2. Chapter Two

(_A/N: had to change a C name…. It had a bit of a squick factor for me. Cherry's name is now Nick_.)

Big Ol' Texas Soul

"_What somebody says about you tells more about them than you."_

Gladiola Montana

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Now, to say no one knew anything about the new Yuy man would not entirely be the truth. There were, in fact, a few who knew the new president of Yuy Business Corporation very well. It was just that those few who knew him well weren't the type to go and mix with the common folk in the mail room. And as everyone knows, the truly pertinent gossip comes from the mail room (not counting the gossip that happens in the mail room, a far different issue entirely, considering the manner in which various persons-who-will-not-be-named 'but we all know who she is, Missy Rump' has slept their way around and out of there).

There was, then, quite a bit of speculation as to what this new leader of theirs was like. Margi from mail room claimed to have met him once. A younger woman herself and painfully single, she had been keeping an eye out two weeks prior for the newest male faces entering the company doors while she worked at delivering mail to the main floor offices.

She had, she reported, noticed a slender, asian man entering the foyer about nine o'clock. He had been accompanied by another japanese man in a white suit. This of course led to why asian men looked so good in white suits and Gordon, in charge of mail room, had to direct them back to the task at hand, that being what exactly the new man was like.

The working group sat around the lunch table, eating cafeteria food and watching Margi's face turn pink in delight at being the first to have sighted the elusive Mr. Yuy.

It was a scene out of a movie, really, one of those Hong Kong kung fu movies, or so Trudy thought. But he didn't say so, keeping this to himself. Still the vision of the former man, his eyes black as a hawk's, striding into the foyer, flanked and slightly ahead of his taller counterpart, a japanese man with hair tied back to the nape of his neck and a decidedly dangerous air about him was straight out of plenty of movies he'd seen lately. It had given Margi chills, she said. And if it reminded her of a Hong Kong kung fu movie, she wasn't saying.

Mr. Yuy did not smile, did japanese smile or was that normal everyone wondered, and neither did his companion. Margi had made sure to have some important letters to put on the check-in desk beside that one guard fellow, Joe.

"He just walked up, smart as you please, he did. And is he glorious or what?" Margi liked words like glorious. She was the type of woman to call a man glorious and expect everyone else to see how he was a god of manhood. She had many glorious men to speak of from many different countries, though she loved using the word for what she thought were greek men the most often. "A little taller than me, 'round five ten maybe, with brown Abercrombie hair. He's got on these sunglasses and he takes them off when he gets close to the desk." Here, Margi gleamed. "His eyes. I'm not joking, are this glorious blue. Like, like some kind of electric color. I've never seen anything like it before. I almost fainted, they're so amazing!"

Of course, then the conversation turned quickly to "glorious" men and how the asian species of man in particular is a beautiful one. Though too short. Gorgeous, did anyone see that guy in Suicide Club, hot as the blazes and too darned short! But Gordon again brought them back.

"So? What happened after?" his voice terse. "We've got only ten minutes left ladies. I want to know what happened after."

"Well," Margi continued, "he looks over me with those glorious blue eyes like he's seeing some bug he could squash, and he nods to the guard. And Joe, he just grins and you know how he is, what an idiot he is? How he got passed up for a job in the police department and ended up doing private security. But anyway, he grins like an idiot and says, 'Mornin' Mr. Yuy. You forgot to sign in last time.' And Mr. Yuy doesn't say a word, just signs in, nods and goes to the elevator." She took a breath with a great grin. "I was so nervous, I dropped my letters. And Mr. Yuy's bodyguard stopped and picked them up. He bowed to me like the japanese do and said, something in his language and handed them to me. He looked me over and I just about fainted. Then he followed his boss. And then they were gone! Well, then that stupid guard guy asked me out for coffee. Of course I said no, you know how he's always hitting on all of the girls."

"Oh yes! Tell me about it! Last week he said he knew a really nice guy I should meet.." went on another of the women, beginning discussion about various womanizers in the company. Gordon (their token gay man) joined in, leaving Trudy feeling as if he were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

There was talk of course, of how quickly the change was made. It took only a week to do all of the paperwork and turn the company over to the young Mr. Yuy.

Odin Yuy had managed to ignore his office for the past few years, coming in only to sign those few papers his signature was needed for. He spent most of his time overseas in Japan, flying in for board meetings once a month. And while the board was in constant flux with changes in its body of six every few years, there remained the consistency of a few known faces, dinosaurs of the company, like Mr. Kirkland and Mr. Hargreaves, who had grown old with Odin over the years.

The company had been content as the great animal it was. There was no need of such a great shift in upper management. Expectation caused everyone to speak of how changes in leadership always led to changes in departments. Discussions on what company might be hiring was the norm for lunch breaks and everyone began talking loud and hard about how important their particular job was to the functioning of the company.

Within the week, sightings of the new president poured into the mail room. Odin Yuy returned to Japan and the board finished up the last of the paperwork expediently. The mail room gloated over every tidbit and pieced together a rather incredible story through which the new addition could be viewed.

Mr. Yuy-san (as he was called in the mail room) was young, only thirty two. He was excruciatingly handsome with blue eyes so blazing they could be sighted no matter the distance. He rarely spoke to anyone but his board and the bodyguard that followed him. Fresh out of college in London, he had taken over a electronics and security company in Japan that his father had holdings in and turned it into a multi billion dollar business. In three years it became the topmost electronic security company in the world. Specializing in high encryption and coding, the company went on to bid for military contracts as well as private company contracts. The unprecedented move to take on foreign security had led to some governmental investigation by Japan. But by some strange twist of fate it was discovered that the company's interactions with foreign powers was not to be a danger and in a matter of months, Japan also was contracting the works of the small company.

Of course, about this time, Trudy Haln of Mail Room C had a visit from his sister's brother from Japan. The man had apparently worked under the indomitable Mr. Yuy-san back in Japan and had a lot to say, much of which made its way further into the mail room gossip.

Apparently Trudy's brother-in-law, Bart Sante, an enormous man from Kentucky with a degree in Harvard business and a rather imposing demeanor, first met Mr. Yuy when the young man had come to the company those few years before.

At first, he reported, things had gone well. Mr. Yuy-san, fresh out of business school, had followed the Kentucky man around, learning the ropes. In fact, Bart had felt they might have become friends of course. But a few months into the year, Mr. Yuy came to work with an assistant, a Mr. Chang. He called an emergency meeting of the heads of all departments. The meeting was terrible. The open, friendly Mr. Yuy had become a cold mechanical monster. By the end of it, only half of the heads of departments were left, and Bart was out of a job.

Trudy wasn't entirely certain that his brother-in-law could be relied upon to be factual. He'd always struck Trudy as a man of temper and rash thinking. Any discussion around Bart could turn into an opinionated argument and often did. The large man knew his facts (or thought he did) and had a belief on everything from single mothers to the recent wars in the southern Americas.

Despite his misgivings, Trudy enjoyed the attention he received in the mostly female mail room when he was able to come up with a tidbit of information no one else had. For a week at least, he was included, asked questions of, and treated with something other than feminine disdain. It was a beautiful time of warmth for him, though quickly over when one of the girls who happened to have to deliver mail to Mr. Yuy's office and instead of getting his secretary, got the man himself and was able to talk to him.

But the time had been worth it, really. Trudy had felt a part of something for the first time since beginning work in mail room C.

While energetic conversations ranged about in the mail room, a quieter hush was to be found in the floors above. Even Mr. June was flirting with the idea that he might have to discover ways to prove that his job was had worth. Still, he was a practical man. There really was no need to go flying off the handle about a rumor and besides, other than overhearing a few snippets here and there, he really wasn't the type of person the real gossip mongers came to. He was, in a sense, very much out of the loop.

This lack of a sense on what talk there was to be had did nothing for his state of mind, however, when he received the letter on eggshell paper with the company letterhead above and the signature in bold, rich ink under the small typed summons.

It was dated that day and apparently Mr. Yuy did not believe in wasting time, for it was expected that Mr. June would make it to the upper offices by two that afternoon and if he was unable to do so for whatever reason, that he would make an appointment with Mr. Yuy's secretary for the next day he was working.

Mr. June, not one to wait out the executioner's ax, was before the secretary at one fifty five that day, adjusting a tie and wondering if he should have asked for a day's leniency so that he might be better presented. He hadn't dressed as well as usual that day, not having any lunch meetings to go to. It just went to show, though, how one never knew when there might be an unexpected turn. And maybe, he could not help but think, he could explain his lack of dress adequately. He spent the next five minutes of waiting trying to find a good excuse for his clothing.

Five minutes past two, the door opened and a tall, stately man with green eyes walked out, gazed at Mr. June with a passing interest not even worth recognizing, and stopped at the secretary's desk.

"Please schedule me for another meeting with Mr. Yuy for next month. I believe he said Tuesday the twenty-sixth would be fine."

Mr. June, feeling somewhat inadequate as he stood waiting to be ushered in, watched as the secretary opened up a file on her computer and began a discussion with the unfamiliar man. He wasn't sure what one was to do when the president of the company called one up. While Mr. June tended toward the timely and being that it was now, seven minutes late which left him with a sudden sense of unease, he also was unsure of exactly how he might point out this fact without seeming too high and mighty.

He settled, in the end, for a small clearing of his throat. And oddly, while the secretary did not look up, the tall man did. "Ah, I'm sorry. Heero mentioned he had a two o'clock. I was told to let the secretary know to send you in directly. But I suppose I could just as easily tell you," and he motioned smoothly at Mr. June and the door in one wave of his hand. The man did not smile, yet he was not cold either. He simply bid, expecting to be obeyed.

If this were the type of company Mr. Yuy kept, what then, would Mr. Yuy be like? Mr. June started, looking at the secretary for confirmation which she gave with an impatient nod of her head. Then girding himself, he pushed open the door and entered an office he'd only been in once, many years before, during a final interview with Mr. Odin Yuy when he was given his promotion to department head at TI.

The office outside with the secretary was one of richness and good taste. The inner office was little different, with a few oil paintings hanging that were not recognizable as important works, yet definitely gave a touch of class to an office made up of leather chairs, a couch, vases of orchids, and strategically placed book shelves.

Mr. June noticed that the door made no sound as it swung closed behind him. There was the scent of paper and books and money in this room despite the flowers. It was nothing like his office which smelled slightly of old coffee and smog and fruit. This office had taste written all over it's curves and angles. The colors matched and there was not a broken down binder or stained coffee cup or mish mashed, many colored conglomeration of pens to be seen. Even the desk was clear of all clutter and Mr. June wondered if the desk's drawers were as clear as the rest of the room was, or if there was some small hint of humanity somewhere, hidden in a dank side drawer where paper clips came in all sizes and were caught up with a grey tattered rubber band.

Mr. Yuy appeared, in ways, very like the words spoken of him. He sat in a high backed power chair behind a massive desk going through a small file before him with an impassive expression on his face as if he didn't truly have any feeling about what he was going over. It might have been accounts as far as he was concerned. However Mr. June recognized the orange folder clip on the edge and realized that it was, in actual fact, a department funds folder. And because he was here, it was more than likely, his department in that folder.

Mr. June's face was anything but inexpressive when he stopped before the leather chair opposite the table and addressed his new boss. "Mr. Yuy."

The man before him waved a hand to indicate the chair and Mr. June sat down, crossing his legs and tucking his fingers around one another like people holding on as the ship goes down.

A moment's silence and then the young, blue eyed man looked up, took off a pair of low-power reading glasses and regarded the older gentleman. "Mr. June. Thank you for coming."

"Of course, Mr. Yuy."

"I have been going over your accounts, Mr. June."

"Yessir?" Mr. June went frantically over his accounts in his head. Had there been any corners he could have cut? Anything he might have done differently? The blue eyes staring at him were disconcerting. They were too penetrating, as if they could read him. Still, Mr. June wasn't about to offer suggestions if he didn't know what the difficulty was. That would be corporate suicide, really, to act as nervous as he really was. He did his best to keep his face calm though he could feel sweat starting to run down his left side.

"I find them to be more than adequate, Mr. June." The blue eyed man's words elicited an unconscious sigh of relief from the accountant and Mr. Yuy's lips curved slightly in a bemused smile. "You thought I had asked you here for not doing your job as well as you were able?"

"It had crossed my mind, sir." Mr. June was surprised to find himself manage a small smile in response. The word, "asked" struck him as funny, somehow. A man like Mr. Yuy never asked, and if he did, his asking was never taken so likely as to be considered anything but a summons.

"Hn," Heero Yuy grunted. It was a strange sound to hear from the man in the power chair and it didn't quite fit the cool, professional exterior he exuded. "Well, in truth, Mr. June, you run a tighter ship than I have ever seen in my years in the business. Suffice it to say, I have not been in this business for that long, but I am aware of what an efficient department is and what it is not. Yours is most definitely well run and I consider you a boon to our company."

"Thank you, sir." Mr. June couldn't believe it. This was far different from what he'd expected.

"I would like to keep you in this role indefinitely, however seeing that you have surpassed my expectations, I think it fair to give you reason to remain and would then like to raise your income level if that is acceptable to you?" Mr. June was sure that he could see a glimmer of amusement now in those blue eyes while Mr. Yuy spoke.

"A… a raise, sir?"

"I dare say that is what they are called, Mr. June."

"Thank you, Mr. Yuy."

Mr. Yuy moved the file to one side and his face became again, a blank slate upon which some unknown fate could be written. "I do have one concern, however. You are, I have been led to believe, in a relationship with one of our upper management, Ms. Utherwood?"

"Yessir." Mr. June felt his back stiffen. Ah, here it was. The blow he'd not allowed himself to fear before.

"Mr. June, I am not in the habit of giving raises to men I am about to fire. Please relax."

"What? Oh, ah, yessir. Sorry, Mr. Yuy," Mr. June stammered.

There, that was a glimmer. Mr. June was sure of it. Deep in those blue eyes, there was something that was far better than a pile of mismatched paper clips buried in the back of an orderly drawer. Mr. Yuy was finding this entire episode hilarious, possibly.

"I have already spoken to her about it, Mr. June. I only wish to state my desires to you as well. It would behoove us all to have the pair of you remain on professional terms while working and that this relationship would be utilized to enhance your work rather than limit it. I have looked over your file and see no decline in your work in the last month or so, therefore I am certain that you have managed to keep a fair division between your professional and your personal life. However I did want to go on record as having said this aloud, rather than simply assume it to be fact. I have no difficulty in the least with office relationships. Only with those which inhibit the ability of my employees to manage their jobs."

"Ah, yessir. I can't imagine myself having any difficulty doing my job. It is rather cut and dried, you see. Technical Instatement is, sir." Mr. June smiled, nervously but with a good deal more certainty than before.

"Please, call me Heero." Mr. Yuy rose and held out his hand.

Taking this to mean that their meeting was over, Mr. June stood as well and shook hands with a greater smile. "Very well, Heero. Thank you."

"Ah, Mr. June?" came the calm voice as Mr. June turned to go.

Looking back Mr. June lifted a brow, watching the slender asian man approach him. It was strange, how this man moved. It reminded Mr. June of a fighter almost, predatory in a way. "Yessir? Err – yes, Heero?"

"I also spoke to your partner about a young man who is at present on extended leave, a Mr. Maxwell?" Blue eyes watched Mr. June's face intently, seeing the sudden panic that flirted with existence then was shoved away.

"Duo, sir? What about him?"

"I was intrigued by the fact we had a young man working for this company without an exact job description. I was glad to see that some of your, as well as many other of my departments', successes could be attributed to his intervention."

"Yes Mr. Yuy, er – Heero. I think I would not be as effective without the aid of Duo Maxwell. He has been instrumental in many projects we've undertaken."

"Yes," Mr. Yuy said meditatively, slowly as if he were buying time in which to think over what he might say next. "I must admit to finding him something of a mystery. He has taken little vacation for himself and suddenly he takes over a month off, now. I have been informed he is taking leave. As you've worked with him fairly consistently and also know his ex-roommate fairly well it is safe to say that you are acquainted with him." Those blue eyes cut into Mr. June as the slim president sat back on the edge of his desk, another small discrepancy that Mr. June wasn't certain exactly how to accept as it didn't fit the presentation he'd been given to that point. Men of Mr. Yuy's caliber did not sit on the edges of their desks.

"I should think so, Mr. Yuy. I do know Duo fairly well. I would hope we might even be friends, sir."

"Heero," automatically corrected the dark haired man and then continued, "Therefore I was under the impression you may know for what reason he has been unavailable for this extended time period? And when he might be coming back."

The panic, once pushed away, fought its way back up into Mr. June's throat. He hadn't really discussed with anyone what to tell Mr. Yuy about Duo. It hadn't been an issue. It wasn't he who was to tell Mr.Yuy what Duo's excuses were. There was no reason to ask Mr. June about Duo's absence. There never had been. That was a question for Delia. What would he say?

"Ah – well, sir – err, Heero, I believe that… That is, I seem to recall Duo telling me that he needed a break. He has, as you said, not had much of a vacation in the time he's worked for the company. And… and he had a fairly traumatic event o-occur…" here, Mr. June was horrified to note that Heero Yuy leaned forward with an considering expression. "I think, but don't know, that maybe he simply needed some time t-to himself?"

Mr. June had never been a good liar. And finding himself giving more information than Mr. Yuy had heard was reason enough to talk to someone about never being placed in this position again. Someone big and upstairs, preferably high upstairs. He'd hit his knees after this meeting and beg for divine intervention.

No, how about now? Mr. June began to swiftly pray that somehow he'd find a reprieve. And yet it looked very much like Mr. Yuy intended to get whatever information he could squeeze from the shy man's head.

But miraculous intervention or just plain luck, Mr. June took note of the pattern on his employer's face as slow internalization of something he'd said inadvertently began and then Mr. Yuy settled again and nodded, apparently satisfied.

"I see," Heero Yuy finally stated. "Thank you. And would you happen to know when he'll be back? But then, from what you've said, it sounds a tad uncertain."

"Err, yes. I think it may be uncertain, but I'd think soon." Mr. June stumbled, trying not to say too much again and feeling terribly as if he were being fed an out.

"Well," said his new boss as he stood and held out his hand for Mr. June to take. "Thank you, Mr. June. I appreciate your confidence as well as your ability to have fulfilled your job so very well. I hope to keep you on as a member of our team for a long while to come."

"Of course, thank you as well, Mr. Yuy," Mr. June answered, face red as he prepared to run.

"Heero," came the correction with a small smile.

"Yes. Heero." Mr. June amended and with a grateful nod of his head, exited the office and carefully walked to the elevator where he got on and punched the number for his floor.

As the silver doors slid shut, Mr. June realized something.

He hadn't given his name.

- - - - - - - - - -

Behind the closed door, Mr. Yuy turned and plucked the slender file from his desk. "Wufei," his voice soft.

From a side door, a slender man, easily mistaken by Americans for Japanese because everyone knew Americans couldn't tell the difference, but who was actually Chinese by birth, stepped into the room and stood quietly.

"Would you do me a favor?" and while the tone of the request sounded more like a command, both men knew very well it was just that, a request. "It will take time away from your Sally, I'm afraid."

"What is it, Heero?"

"I need an employee looked into," and here, Heero Yuy plucked a platinum pen, heavy and cool, from the desk and wrote in fine ink a name on a small memo pad. Holding it out to his friend he sighed. "Let's find out what this 'medical condition' is that he has, shall we?"

Wufei Chang, a calm man and very much not a body guard for Heero Yuy needed no such thing, merely nodded, taking the paper between thumb and forefinger.

"I'll see what I can do."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - -

"Umm, so.." the softened lilt to the secretary's voice tips him off as to a shift in perception. Duo turns and eyes the young woman, taking note of her flushed cheeks, sparkling eyes. Oh yes, she's beautiful. Pity, really. She probably even knows it. It's the trouble with people who are beautiful, knowing it. Duo prefers the kind who don't have a clue. They're more real in a sense.

Or maybe not. He gives her a half smile, not willing to go into full blown flirt mode here in the waiting room when his boss might step out any second from the double oak doors at his side.

"I've uh, heard about you," she's trying, bless her. And that violet gaze is virtually making her stupid. She groans inwardly as she hears herself.

"You have, have you?" okay, so he couldn't help the little flirt in him. He tucks the arm holding his file closer to his abdomen and tilts his head to one side, knowing that when he does this, his braid sways a tad to one side and women love to see that, the end flipping against his hip. "All bad I hope."

"Well yes, or - oh! No, no I mean.," she stammers and he laughs. Then realizing that what she's doing is fairly obvious, she laughs as well.

"Look…" he pauses and reaches out, plucking her name plate an inch off of the desk and tilts it so he can read it, " - Shelly, it's nice of you but I'm about to have a meeting with Mr. Headhunter himself. How about we talk after, if I'm still with my head?" He shoots her a cocky grin and is pleased to see her turn a brighter shade of red. Oh yes, there is something powerful, very powerful about a singular look at a woman.

Duo likes the reactions he gets. It helps keep everything else at bay. Searching so desperately for some sense of control over his own destiny, a sense of control that doesn't include any of his other vices, alcohol being the least of his worries. It was nice when he batted his eyes a few times and they flocked to him.

He'd been mowing his way through the hordes in the last two weeks since coming back. And she was number, oh, fifteen was it?

"I think that would be nice," she simpers and Duo smiles in response, watching how a simple smile can make her heart beat a tad faster. She hasn't been paying attention to the gossip from the mail room he knows is spoken about him, or she simply doesn't care.

Not that he cares either way.

"And if I do have my head, would you like to -" Duo purrs.

"Ms. Estry, please send Mr. Maxwell in," the sharp voice from the telephone at her elbow makes the pair of them jump. Shelly gives Duo a guilty grin before she touches a page button and in a collected, professional voice one would expect from the secretary of a president of a large company, intones her acceptance.

"Go right ahead in, Mr. Maxwell."

Duo feels her eyes on him as he opens the door and enters.

The office within, man. Nice one, really. He manages to fix his mask on more firmly, refusing to gape around him, but he makes a sudden and quick decision that this office is incredibly impersonal. He is envious for a moment, wishing his office had the same, inhuman sense to it, as if no one lived there.

"Mr. Maxwell," the man at the desk stands and holds out his hand and Duo takes it with a half smile that falters. "Please sit."

Duo sees a reflection of the office in the man who reseats himself with a touch to his suit jacket to keep it from unwanted wrinkles. Then his violet eyes flicker down to the file on the table. It has official written all over it, heavy enough for a coffee table read, the thing has to be at least four inches deep.

He whistles, adjusting his tie as he does so. "I hope that's not all of my sins there in that file," he jokes and looks back to the pair of blue eyes staring at him, as piercing and as cold as a bird of prey. With a sense of dread, Duo realizes he is actually hoping that his name is not on that file tab. There is no reason to have that much information on him.

"Your… sins, Mr. Maxwell? What a strange choice of words."

Duo's mask settles quietly and he tucks his initial reaction into his gut where it lays, trembling like a dove hiding from a hunting dog, its wing shot through. He can feel the seeping of blood from the wound drip down into the base of his soul. "I meant it as a joke, Mr. Yuy." Something tells him that Mr. Yuy doesn't care for him much.

Good. Because he finds he doesn't care much for Mr. Yuy.

Mr. Yuy sighs as if put upon and opens the folder, looking at it a moment before speaking to it. "In here, Mr. Maxwell, I have a great many reports. Some are glowing, amazing accounts of your more than adequate work. Some have a far darker spin to them. You do realize, Mr. Maxwell," and here, the man's blue eyes swoop back upwards and fix on Duo's, "that I care about the health of each and every one of my employees. If you are ill, as your file seems to indicate you having had to take a great amount of time off for health reasons, though it does not tell much of what exactly the health issue is, then I need to be assured you are not bound for a relapse."

Duo could feel his body go hard. Well, that was a veiled threat. "I don't see a relapse happening any time soon, sir," he grinds out stiffly.

"Good," Mr. Yuy responds and looks pointedly at his employee. I expect it to remain that way."

Then, without skipping a beat, he continues, flipping through some papers within the file, "You work sixty plus hours a week, you're well liked among your coworkers, you seem to even be a subject of great consideration in our mail room." There is a hint of something in that voice and Duo doesn't like it. Mockery, perhaps?

Besides, the man has only been here for little under two months. How did he learn where the main brunt of gossip comes from?

Damn him already. Duo snarls within, dragging his wounded wing even deeper inside, wondering if the flare of disgust and rage shows in his eyes and hoping that his mask has remained true to its power of concealment. "So I've heard, Mr. Yuy."

"As have I. I wonder how you manage to get such a reputation, working this long. And seeing the work you've brought in, I dare say much of your time is being put into the private time you have as well. In fact, Mr. Maxwell, considering your strange propensity to be able to fulfill whatever needs your coworkers have and your exemplary work record with almost no vacations and only a handful of sick days over four and a half years as well as a decided drive to do your work and do it well, I would say you are quite a gift to this company. I hope you remain that way." Mr. Yuy stands at that and holds out a hand.

Duo, realizing he had stood as well, stares at the hand and then takes it as professionally as he's able but he can't force his eyes to match his smile, he never seems to be able to do that. "I hope so too, sir."

A moment later, exiting the office, Duo holds his folder closer to himself, reminding himself he can get someone else to show Mr. Yuy the plans he has drawn up for the Ulat case because that was not what Mr. Yuy had asked him up for.

Not allowing a shattering experience like that to affect his memory, he gives the girl at the desk a small grin. "Head still on!" and passes on before she can ask for a date. He has to say no anyway. He has things to do tonight.

Work goes quickly and Duo manages to put a few projects he'd slated to finish that night to the side, considering that he had two weeks yet on most of them, finishing the most important, putting a note on the Ulat folder for the Holdings Department head, Mrs. Iveron, a rather difficult woman and very capable of taking responsibility for the good ideas in the folder when she presents it to Mr. Yuy later in the week, he tucks his umbrella under his arm and exits, past the waterfall stairs outside.

The aspen trio whispers something he won't listen to as he lifts his hand and hails a taxi. The yellow slash of color across the black and silver of this upper crust business district seems almost garish and wrong. But that's okay. Because where it stops, it will fit right in.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Sara Nesi thinks her parents were jewish. She figures that makes her a bit of an anomaly, considering she is deeply Christian. But maybe not. She knows, however, that whatever her parents were, she's sure to follow her own path in life and if that path includes going to church every Sunday morning, then so be it. And if that path also includes Ides Tavern, then it does too.

She never drinks. She isn't old enough to, actually. But the barkeep, a bear of a man named Jerome, likes her and it keeps her warm until three or four a.m. She doesn't have to walk the streets this way either because Jerome pays her if she picks up the peanut shells and helps him wipe down the bar after closing time. "Never bin cleaner'n when you were 'round, kid," he'd say and she likes that he needs her.

She's only fifteen, skinny as a stork with eyes too big for a face that it too bony. Her nose doesn't fit her face, longer than it should be, and yet there is in her an upcoming beauty many of the older men recognize because they know more about how women grow then the younger men do who play darts in the back of the bar and slap one another on the backs about who messed with who last night.

Because it's Thursday evening, there aren't that many of the younger types in the bar. Most of the men in the building are regulars and they sit quietly over pint glasses of ale because Jerome likes to call his place an Irish pub, stating that he's half Irish so he might as well serve drinks like the Irish do.

She sits at the bar, swinging her scrawny legs and chewing on a peanut shell as she watches the soccer tournament on television. The sound is off, but she doesn't need sound to know what's going on. In the background someone has fed the jukebox and it's playing old Guns n'Roses. Because of the choice, she thinks it might be Ned because Ned is a child of the eighties, complete with outdated mullet, but she can't be sure. There are some unknown faces in the tavern.

Ides Tavern is a fairly straight up, yank tavern. It is obvious what it is by how it looks on the outside. People don't come here to dance. People don't come here to meet classy folks. They don't come here to deal drugs and they don't come here to hang out with the up and coming crowd. They come here to pick up women with hair spray clouds following them wherever they go and to drink pints of ale courtesy of Jerome. It is a rather select clientele. And the tavern crew is rather comfortable with the fact that they're closed minded, lower class, blue collar, stiffs.

But just like any crew, there is always going to be some anomalies. Not too many mind you, but one or two fit the bill nicely and keep everyone entertained.

Roger Paulson is classified as an anomaly in the Ides Tavern. A psychologist with a 200K job and a wife and three kids in ivy league schools as well as one more heading there next year, he doesn't fit. Just showed up one day, seven years before, dead drunk from a run about on the north side, and wanting to find a place that would serve him good whiskey. Jerome had plenty of that and some fellow in the cab he'd caught told him so and he ended up in Ides. He hadn't left either.

Roger isn't a drunk nor is he an alcoholic. He comes in once or twice a month and everyone knows him. Plastered men solicit his advice and he charges them a shot of whiskey for his words and they cough up the money even though he has enough to buy round after round for the entire bar.

Nick Cherry is another. Sara likes him because he's cute, lanky like her, and as blonde as a Florida beach sun. He rarely drinks but he likes the pool tables and the darts and he always brings a date. His straight edge ways don't bother any of the guys and they tolerate the fact that he refuses to get drunk with the rest of them because he's good looking and he's a sober, quiet spoken man that a body can't help but like. Funny as hell, too.

Of course, everyone felt sorry for Nick too. He has a habit of taking out girls that need him and then after a few weeks of being used for his money or his listening ear, he's always dumped usually because he's "too nice." No one has the heart to tell Nick that the girls are right. He's going for girls who don't want to take away the innocence that they don't even remember having and it frightens them. He needs to go for some gal from a church.

Which is exactly why Sara goes to church and why she's a Christian. Or at least why she started a year ago. She wants to be that nice girl that Nick will look at one day and realize what he's had under his nose all this time. Then he'll pick her up and take her back home and let her stay in his house and they'll get married and he'll bring her flowers from her garden every day. Even in the winter because she'll ask him to make a green house abutting the house and he'll do it because he'll do anything for his young wife.

Sara hasn't told anyone but Duo about this though. She's just waiting for Nick to notice her. So far he's keeping to the girls with the hair sprayed, funny colored hair and the orange, alien faces with too much cake foundation on.

She leans her elbow on the counter and pulls the peanut shell out of her mouth, staring at how the dark valleys and lighter colored ridge patterns runs up and down the curved sides. One of the teams scores a team but she doesn't know who is playing. She is mentally rooting for the team in green and white because she likes their uniforms best, but she won't mind if they lose.

With a sigh she drops her arm, curling her fingers around the peanut shell, lays her head on her upper arm, and stares at the man sitting next to her.

He smiles over his pint at her, his long hair curling around his shoulder and then weaving it's way across his sleeve because that's how she put it. He'll try and keep his arm still for as long as he can for her. It's just the way Duo Maxwell is.

"Bored, kid?" he grins.

"Nah," she smiles back. "Just wondering where you been."

Duo Maxwell is another of the anomalies. He has long hair so he's like a hippy, but it's pretty hair, in a braid most often, and he keeps his face clean shaven. He usually comes to Ides twice a month or so and has for forever. Sometimes he brings a friend along with him, but usually he comes alone. And the friends never come back. And she never likes them much. They remind her of hungry mouths, the friends he brings, sucking off energy from the light he carries around in himself.

Sara has told Duo things that she hasn't told anyone. And he's told her things he's never told anyone, or so he claims. She doesn't miss the sudden flash of pain in his eyes and he doesn't try to hide it behind the mask he's wearing, the one she can see right through. "Rehab," he answers quietly.

"AA?" she lifts a brow. There's a bunch of guys here who go to AA meetings regularly.

"A-yup," he nods and draws a happy face in the dewy side of his glass. "Clean for a month and a half, until t'night."

She sighs. "Sucks to be you."

He laughs then and nods. "Yeah. It does."

Sara isn't stupid and she folds her hand across her chin and chews on the knuckle of her thumb. "So what set you off?" As he looks at her as if she shouldn't know that kind of thing she grins. "I've seen so many fall off, Duo, you'd never believe it. It's always somethin'."

"Damn, why couldn't you have been my fuck buddy?" he growls. She doesn't take offense at the words because she's heard them before and she knows what they mean.

"Because I don't touch the stuff," she answers.

"I got a new boss at work."

"Yeah?" she glances at the television. Someone is driving down center, the ball is skipped around deftly in feet that seem to be as capable as hands holding an egg, and then stolen just as easily, heading back the other way.

"Yeah, blue eyes."

Sara pauses and then looks back at her friend. "Hmm.." and she almost doesn't pry. But curiosity gets the better of her. "So what's so bad about blue eyes?"

He laughs bitterly and she isn't surprised or saddened by it. It's half the reason why most of the patrons of Ides can talk to her. Sara has seen enough pain in her life to fill a ten thousand gallon oil drum, but she's remained innocent somehow through it all. It can't touch her like it touches them, hearing about their pain. It's meaningless in the way a reading of Shakespeare is to the brain of a five year old. Being around Sara is like being in a temple. Your words just resound and come back to you, as empty as they were when you let them go. But because this temple has muddy hazel eyes and a too long nose and is going to be beautiful one day, you don't feel the need to pick them back up again and you're free in a way. At least for the moment.

"Nothin'," he complains. "It was just an observation. He's japanese, they say, and he's got blue eyes. It's weird. He hates me. And he knows that I'm back from rehab. Told me to get m'shit together or get out."

"He really said that?" She knows where Duo works. It is strange to think of any of those people she's seen walk in and out of the building in their suits and ties as having the ability to say get yer shit t'gether or get out.

"Not in so many words, no. But he was saying it anyway. And I think Delia spilled the beans. It isn't so bad that he hates me. I mean, I'll rarely see him at all. Never saw his dad but once. It's the fact that Delia told him. She said she wasn't going to say a word." He lifts the untouched pint and then puts it back down on the counter. "Dammit."

"You can still walk out, y'know," Sara reminds him and reaches over, pushing the glass away from his laxe fingers.

"From work? or from here?" he smiles at her painfully.

"Both, I guess," she shrugs and watches him snake a hand out and grab the glass, pull it closer.

"Yeah, so it's up to me, isn't it?"

He's not looking at her anymore though and she knows he's not really asking her. But she answers anyway.

"Yep. It's up to you." And with a soft sigh, she watches him tip back the glass and take down the amber liquid as if it were air.

Then she adds gently and to herself more than to anyone near, "Just wish it weren't."

He grimaces and puts the glass down, hooks his arm around her shoulder and snorts in humor. "You and me both, kid." And with his warmth draped over her, she looks up to see how the team in green and white are doing.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"_DELIA!_" the thunder of a name being called from a distance wakes up Delia Underwood from a deep sleep. She can hear a pounding but it's not anywhere nearby. Still, she could have sworn she heard her name. What was it with the neighbors? Were they having a party again? Weren't they gone? She had thought they were gone to the west coast for the week. She'd been looking forward to full nights of sleep.

She sits up, looking for her watch and once finding it, touching the knob on the side and reading the time.

"_DELIA!_"

Frowning, she stands and goes to her bedroom window. Opening it, she looks out but the screen prevents her from seeing well. She can hear the pounding though.

"What is it?" a gentle mumble comes from her bed and she looks back at where Matthew lays, wondering if she should trouble him. But she is sure she knows who that voice belonged to.

"Nothing, hon. Go to sleep," she smiles and wrapping her robe around her body, patters down the steps and to the front door.

"DELIIAAAA!" the loud call is clear now with the front door open. As is the pounding. Shivering, Delia steps out onto the steps and stares at the ragged, braided man pounding on her neighbor's door.

"Duo?" She cuts him off as he starts to call her a fourth time. "Duo. It's three in the morning, what on earth?"

He leans his head on the door and looks at her blearily. "Hey, you moved!" he complains as he pushes off of the door and stumbles to her.

Taking his arm, she helps him inside and lets him fall onto the couch. "What are you doing, Duo? You're drunk!" Delia can't keep the displeasure from her voice.

"Fuck you," he snarls and she stares, shocked.

"Delia?" Matthew, tying his robe, enters the living room and touches a light switch. A small lamp near the window flares to life. "What is going - oh, Duo!" He takes everything in with a glance and then frowns.

"An' fuckyu too!" the drunk man points a wavering finger at Matthew.

Delia sighs. Duo rarely has gotten drunk. She can count easily the times she's seen him in this state. But never has he been mean. Duo was more of what one would call a happy drunk. This was definitely not happy.

With a frown, she quickly retrieves a bucket from under the downstairs bathroom sink, fills the bottom of it with water and returns, placing it beside the now quiet Duo. "Duo, why don't you sleep this off, honey," she murmurs in a placating way.

"Hn. Sure. So y'kin stab me'n th'back agin!" he raises his head and stares at her balefully. "'Spose'ta be m'friend, Delia."

"Now look here, Duo," Matthew shows a rare fit of temper and barks out at the ill man on his couch.

"Matthew, please," Delia's plea mixes with another round of "fuck yous" from their patient, ending in a soft moan of, "Think'm gon'be sick."

She tucks her hand under Duo's hair and guides him to lean over the bucket where he begins to relieve his body of the fouls smelling stuff. She closes her eyes and tries to ignore the stench and when he's done, looks over at Matthew tiredly. "Go back to bed, Matt. I'll take care of this."

Matthew, stubborn for once and completely unbiddable, scowls and sits in a chair across from her. "I think I shall stay here, my dear," in his PBS detective voice. She's come to know the voice and he's told her all about his small fantasy and she understands it so she doesn't fight him on it, though things would be easier if she only had Duo to tend to and worry over.

Duo is sick again and she is careful to keep his braid from falling into the bucket. When it seems he's done, she takes a chance and goes to dump the contents into the toilet, rinse out the bucket, refill it's bottom with about an inch of clean water, and then return.

Duo is breathing heavily on the couch, his face pale and his eyes small slits of silver which watch her seat herself beside him. With her hand on the rim of the bucket, she gives him a long hard look.

He whimpers.

"What is it, Duo?" she sighs.

"Fucker thre-threatened me.." Duo moans in a very Duo like whine. It was rare, but she'd been party to it a time or two. Usually when they wanted something from Matthew. Still, it is strange to hear it in earnest.

"Who threatened you, Duo?" Matthew straightens up instantly, bristling. He had a priority list. Delia was first on that list and no one was allowed to hurt her. But Duo brought up a close second in his mind. It warms her to see him so quickly leap into protective mode.

"Mr. Fuckin' I Own You Yuy, thaz hoo!" Duo spits out and then groans in pain. "I dun'feel so good."

"You're drunk, Duo. I don't expect you've ever felt good when you were this drunk," she reminds him.

"Use'ta b'able ta drink morr," he slurs and smiles up at her. "Y'know, 'e's got th'prittiest eyes. All blue, like th'sky on'y prettier…"

"So I've heard," Delia answers and then in a rush to distract him from talking about Heero Yuy in that manner in front of Matthew or anyone, for that matter, she puts her hand on his forehead. "You should rest, Duo. We'll talk about it in the morning."

"Talk bou'wha?" he smiles again. "Blue?"

"No, about the threats," she hesitates to say, but throws out desperately.

"Oh," his face turns black again and he closes his eyes, rolling over on his side and tucking his knees up to his chest in misery. "Yeah. Can't b'lieve y'told him I was a drunk, Dee. Go'way, hunh?"

"Told him - " Delia stops and stares at the suddenly snoring man on her couch.

With a sigh, she stands up and looks over at Matthew. At a loss, she shakes her head and leans over, picking up his hand and giving it a tug. He follows with a shocked expression still, then recalls himself and kisses the side of her mouth.

"We'll work out whatever it is in the morning, Delia. I'm sure it's something we can explain."

But she wasn't all that certain if it was.

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

Duo wakens around eleven in the morning, his head pounding and his body feeling drained. The scent of coffee drifts over his nostrils and he cracks an eye into the bright afternoon sunshine coming through the window. Why couldn't it have rained today or something, he wonders. Then at least the sunshine would be muted.

He wonders at the room he finds himself in for a moment before he recognizes it as the one he helped break in the first night Delia and Matthew moved in together. He'd slept right here. On Matthew's couch. Or, rather, it was their couch now. There wasn't any need to use single possessives when you were talking about Matthew and Delia any longer. Everything that had been one or the other's was now a "theirs."

Amazing how that happens.

A rustle in the direction of the kitchen reminds him that he's not alone and with a moan, he slowly sits up.

"Here," a cup of coffee is thrust before him. He stares at the pale hand and the peach colored nails a moment before he takes the cobalt blue cup from her. Something about that color reminds him of -

Yeah, no need to go there. Not this morning and on an empty stomach.

"I got drunk," he sighs.

"Yes," she answers and he winces as he looks up, his eyes catching some light before focusing in the shadows of her face.

"Sorry." He has been a shmuck. A real shmuck, not a pretend one. "And I did it right after he told me not to, either." He groans.

"He _told_ you not to get drunk?" Delia seems honestly surprised. "How could he have ever known?"

Narrowing his eyes against the sun and against the unkind thoughts in his head, he squints at her. "Figured you'd told him," and he almost manages to keep the frigid chill out of his voice.

"Oh Duo," she sits down next to him, touching his knee and he doesn't pull away. "I told him you had a sensitive medical issue and that you'd come back when you were well. I said nothing about your drinking." Staring at him, she tightened her hold on his knee. "Duo? You have to believe me. I would never do anything like that to you. I can even show you your file. It has - "

"Speaking of my file," he interrupts. "Why the fuck is it so thick?"

"Thick?" she stares at him. "What do you mean thick? It isn't any different from anyone else's. And I don't think I'd call that thick, really."

"What do you mean, you wouldn't call it thick? Delia, the thing is this deep!" and he holds up his finger and thumb, indicating how far top and bottom are from one another.

She stares at his fingers and shakes her head. "No, Duo. I've seen your file. It isn't that thick. It's the same as mine. It has a few of your forms, like insurance and some contract forms in it, but it isn't even a tenth of that thickness. Why did you think it was that large?"

Duo blushes. "Because he - Mr. Yuy, had it on his desk. Or… well, I thought he did." He rubs his temple and then runs his fingertips across his brow with a grimace. "Man, fell off the wagon for a misunderstanding." There is a sense of defeat in his voice and it scares Delia Utherwood.

"You didn't fall off, Duo. You had a minor glitch, like Matthew calls them. Don't think like that!"

He gives her a sardonic grin and gripping his cup, stands up. "What did I say last night?"

Blushing, she recounts what she can recall and ends with a soft, "But I understood. And I helped as well as I could."

They both knew what she was talking about and he grips her arm, pulling her up into a fierce hug. "Thank you, Dee. I don't know what I'd do without you, girl."

She laughs in a broken, choked up sort of way into his shoulder and hugs him tightly back. "You'd keep on doing what you do, but you'd just be without me."

"Yeah, but I-"

The phone rings and the pair look over at it. With a sigh, Delia lets go of her friend and goes to pick it up.

"Delia speaking…. Oh hello, Shelly. - Hmm? Yes, he's here. I'm glad Matthew told you. … no, no he'll be well by tomorrow I'm sure. I just wanted to keep an eye on him. He was pretty ill last night…. Thank you. Thank you, I'll tell him. Okay, goodbye."

Letting the handset click into the cradle with a slow, deliberate motion, Delia turns a concerned look upon Duo and chews on her lower lip.

"Mr. Fuckin' Jerkwad himself?" he lets fly, watching how she winces away from his enmity. Hatred. That's another type of power. Hatred and sex. He was good at both, but he generally tried to keep her safe from those parts of himself.

"Yes," she murmurs and then, hesitantly adds, "he wants you to come in to see him tomorrow morning, first thing. Shelly said that if you're better, he'll expect it."

"Yeah," he grumbles. "I bet he will."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

((_Another chapter done! I can hardly believe it! I think I'm very grateful for weekends off. I had forgotten who I was there for a while with all the traveling and stuff. But with snow coming, travel is out and I'm snowbound to my home town. Yay! _

_Anyway, on to you marvelous reviewer peoples! _

_BlackX: Hee hee. I'm glad you liked it! Thank you! I hope chapter two managed to fit in with whatever expectations ch. one started! _

_Dyna: There ARE a lot of characters! Though some of them only pop up once or twice. I've taken to keeping a document solely to keep track of who is where. Never had to do that before. : ) But it's fun! Glad you're willing to slog through all the words and enjoy the story! I promise I'll keep at it! I just wanted to finish Yoedian Arl. I had another fic I was going to do as well, but I'm putting that to the side until this one is done. I don't wanna be cruel! So the updates shall come more quickly than I'd supposed. _

_Crimson Release: Thank you! I shall keep to it as well as I'm able! Glad you're enjoying it! _

_kcgal: Wow. Thank you very much. I think Duo has a tough road ahead of him. I can't claim angst as well as some marvelous authors, but hopefully this will be a good stab at it without being too over the top. _

_Leemax: Thank you! And yeah, I'm a 1x2 fan too. Heck, I'm a "anyone goes!" fan, actually. : ) _

_Blooknaburg: Ooo! Chewing on fiction. I'll tell Duo to beware of the drool -heh-. So yeah! Hee-chan will do some whipping I hope soon. But then again, maybe Duo will have to do the whipping. Either way you look at it, I don't think they got off to a very good start. I'm so glad you like it! I do too::beaming:_ ))


	3. Chapter Three

Big Ol' Texas Soul

"_The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time._  
'_Please - tame me!' he said."_  
- Antoine de Saint Exupery

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The coffee in Duo's hand is cooling already. Across the top a skim of pale white tells the entire world of Mr. June's distinct dislike for anything close to real cream for his coffee.

The man had a personal vendetta against milk. If it was what mankind needed, they'd have been born a cow. Hell, even cows didn't drink milk after a point of time. Why should human kind feel it necessary to continue suckling at a teat that wasn't theirs?

Or that is how Duo thinks of Matthew's opinions of the matter. The truth is actually far less crude and far more PBS'ish, kind of like Oliver Twist asking for more, never having enough. Matthew June is careful with his money and he sees no reason to spend that much money on cream. And as for milk, it gives him a rash.

The whirling oily sheen of fake pale white undulates when Duo coughs. His breath slants across the surface but cannot seem break the oils apart. He tilts his cup to one side and then to the other, watching the play of light across it, a rainbow in your cup of coffee. It makes him laugh and the laugh hurts his head.

The sound of a shower going, like a whine of a distant engine, informs him exactly where Delia has gone since she left him after hanging up the phone. He stands, holding the cup to his ribs and not noticing nor caring how its warmth seeps into his palms, trying to flitter against his stomach. Warmth is not helping his headache, it's not helping his hangover. And damned if he'll drink coffee. He needs to make a phone call instead.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Tate Burnside first came to be called Burnie by his mother. She hadn't been the most maternal of women. Her idea of loving relationship was a man from the local bar, her bedroom, and making sure to scream so loud her five children couldn't sleep because the walls were altogether thin between her bedroom and theirs. Burnie came to know the sound of women reaching orgasm before he even knew the sound of his own name.

The day he turned two and four months, his father had left them all to try and find a way to live better with a Las Vegas show girl, like the worst, most idiotic Southern written cheap novel plot. Since that day, he'd been called Burnie. Even from two and four months, he keeps a memory of the look on his mother's face when she informed him that his 'father' was a low down good for nothing shit fly boy and she'd die before she let her youngest be named after him. She renamed him Burnie and he thinks even now how it was ironic, being called a parody of his father's last name instead of the honest disgust of his father's first. Time did nothing to erase the burden of that first name.

There were five of them to begin with. Now, he's the last of three and still the only boy. His oldest sister died of complications due to AIDs at the age of twenty seven, two years before he moved in with Duo. The second sister became a mother by fourteen and has four kids of her own. Like her mother, three are from different fathers and the oldest of her four knows what it was like to have a thin wall between herself and her mother's love. He doesn't talk to his second sister much, she looks nothing like his mother but there is a light in her eyes that makes his stomach churn with a glimmering pool that he doesn't want to believe is hatred. If he keeps away from her, he can feel pity.

His third, Odessa, turned twenty six this July and works for a high power lawyer in New York City. Unmarried, she reads big books that she brings up along with famous names she slings at her siblings whenever she can, trying desperately to prove to someone that she has worth. She was always the pretty one of the family. She was the one that was most outgoing, as opposed to the shy milk sops the rest of them were. And she was the one who had been sexually abused when she was nine. She is a lesbian who hasn't come out, but she's told Burnie and he doesn't think she was born that way, like the other lesbians he's met. He feels positive that she chose women because they couldn't tear her insides like his mother's second husband had. He still speaks to Odessa on holidays. She is the only of his siblings he does.

Myriam, only two years older than he and just thirteen months younger than Odessa, committed suicide when she was sixteen. She'd left no note before she stole their step father's hunting rifle and used it on herself. She had shot herself towards midnight in the middle of the family living room and Burnie is convinced that she positioned herself so that when the bullet tore through her brain, she'd be sure to fall on her mother's favorite couch.

The gun shot had torn the entire family from their rooms. Burnie's world slowly shattered into shards of glass and broke away the last tie that kept him bound. Myrian was the poet, the gentle one, who had loved Burnie and carried him in her own pudgy arms when he was young. She'd been all of the mother she was able, even at two years older and barely able to fulfill the natural instinct in her to love someone, anyone.

Burnie had stood at the doorway to the living room, staring at the white socks with pink hearts on his sister's twitching feet. His mother screamed at Myriam's body and kicked her and called her an ungrateful little bitch. Imagine, her doing that on purpose. Of course she had, and they all knew it. So his mother had felt it perfectly acceptable to kick her one last time and scream at her just moments after the gun shot had declared war on the paisley couch.

Burnie left home soon after. He was only fifteen but he said he was sixteen and got a series of under the table jobs at restaurants down on the west side of town where stew bums rounded out the corners and french fries could be a couple of days old, but they were a buck a basket.

For extra income, he made computers from parts he bought for cheap from people who didn't like their computers anymore. He could use an old tower, soak it in rubbing alcohol until it was clean. Then he'd take the old fans and modems and connectors and slot coverings and buy premium CPUs and hard drives and sometimes a new CD or DVD drive if there wasn't already one in there. And he'd put it all together and sell it as if it were new. He could make quite a bit off of a refurbished system like that and he always put a warranty on them because he knew the newer pieces wouldn't be a problem. The parts to replace filled a shelf in the bathroom of his studio apartment.

Then, at seventeen, he'd passed his GED, the test almost laughable to a kid as naturally smart as he. And with GED under arm and a bit of a sense of entitlement, together with a chip on his bowed shoulders, he'd entered a local college. A scholarship at the end of the year paid for the next three. He's not minded having to pay off that first year, and he worked with the computer gig for an entire year after school was out, paying off some ten thousand in school loans. Not much, considering where he began.

The refurbishing deal was okay but he found that restaurant work could be exchanged for working for an ISP throughout his college career. Still, leaving school he's since begun an internet business, supplying computers that are almost completely new, custom made systems, to private clients all around the world. He even can do some security stuff and he had just branched out into warehousing supplies and becoming a middle man known for cutting corners for his customers just a few months after getting the new apartment with Duo Maxwell. He's doing well for himself and because he lives on coffee and cheap pasta, he has done even better. He figures eventually it will all pay off. He already has thirty four thousand in the bank that he's saved. That is a hell of a lot more than most twenty three year olds can complain over.

Burnie has a girlfriend that he hasn't told anyone about. She is an internet relationship and lives in Sweden. He likes that because he can talk to her while he works and she doesn't know he is focusing some of his attention elsewhere, apart from her. It helps that she isn't the fastest typist in the world and he is.

She has talked of coming to the US to see him. Maybe the next summer? He isn't sure of this. He sent her a picture of Duo and some of the guys hanging out and had picked a semi plain, but sort of cute face from the group, telling her that it was him. She sent him a picture of herself and she looks like a cheerleader in a ski outfit. He will have to break up with her before summer then. Which is really too bad because he likes her. He thinks he could pretend to be sick and die, or maybe he could pretend to be a wife and write her a letter. It is fairly normal that people on the internet lie to one another.

Of course, he wouldn't mind being honest with her if he thought it would get him anywhere. He's talked to her about things like physical appearances and hair and health and other things that he hoped would let him know how good his chances were. The end result? Not good.

The man in the picture has brown hair and a nice smile. Burnie has a need for braces for his lower jaw, his hair is dirty blonde and there isn't enough of it though he's not had to stoop to doing a comb over or anything. He hasn't cut it in a while so it hangs limply to just past his collar and it almost covers where his scalp is starting to show due to male pattern baldness. He is slightly overweight in the belly area and that portion of him is growing, despite his eating little more than Ramen and humus with pita bread. The Macaroni and Cheese doesn't help much, he supposed. He read somewhere that refined flours led to obesity.

Oh, and his feet stink.

It isn't that his feet aren't clean. He struggles often with athlete's foot and he is too lazy to do anything drastic about it. He clears it up some and then he pick it up again. He tries sprays to make his feet less sweaty and special detergents. He buys new socks whenever he can. He even washes his shoes every few weeks. But the smell permeates the fabrics and the act of taking off his shoes lends everything in a room a sour scent that makes people's noses crinkle in disgust. As a result, he rarely takes off his shoes and that only makes the problem worse. It is the perfect Catch 22.

Therefore, he's come to the conclusion that he can't meet his girlfriend from Sweden with a paunch, bad teeth, a balding head, and smelly feet. She doesn't like bad smells. She's said as much when he asked her what smells disgusted her the most. She told him the smell of belly lint and feet. She'd laughed at how that was disgusting to say but insisted it is true. And she won't tell him what belly lint smells like.

He has non-smelly belly lint. He doesn't see himself finding out what the foul smelling belly lint is like.

Body odors aside, it is important to note that while his body may not be a temple, the room where his system resides is very much so. In the dimly lit room aside a bed, sits a great table with two monitors, one on either side. The monitors, networked and set up to accept the same mouse (depending on how far you move it across the desktop, are both black with airbrushed pictures on their sides, a rat with a bull dog collar around its neck on the furthest, and a naked woman with her legs spread wide on the other. Burnie is, if nothing else, very fastidious about his computer space.

File drawers on either side of the chair hold order forms both in and out, manuals, vintage Playboy magazines, and three ring binders full of paperwork. Above the desk on a long shelf is a range of things from a transformer (Megatron), dictionaries, and old computer sci books, to hentai manga shipped in from Japan so that the plots are lost under script Burnie cannot read and a picture of his swedish girlfriend. Below, in amongst the cd cases and the dvd covers and a few stray parts, sits a slender black phone, airbrushed across the top as a black panther. Over the panther is a sheen of invisible packing tape because the artist told him it would keep the paint from being worn off by his hand on his phone all of the time. The tape almost ruins the picture, though he used a table knife to try and smooth it down, because light from the screen glares off of the tape and the image is all but lost.

The phone has a nice electronic call sound that comes over the computer speakers. But rarely does anyone use the phone line to contact him. It's always a bit of a surprise to hear the sound clip from Fifth Element of Leeloo's scream coming over his speakers and he almost spills his Cupa'Noodles on his desk.

"Shit!" Burnie curses and sucks at the broth on the back of his hand, wipes if off on his flannel pj bottoms, then moves a manual to the side so he can put down the cup of noodles while Leeloo screams a second time.

"Burnside's Computers," he says automatically.

The conversation would be rather anticlimactic to explain at present and as only one side of the conversation would be heard over the hum of electronics in Burnie's room, one can only imagine what was the purpose. But it can't have been all that good, for by the time Burnie puts the phone down with a "Sure thing, man. Anytime," in his rather slow, almost drugged out voice, his face no longer looks calm and easy. Rather, he has a bit of a pensive expression and he runs his fingers through his lanky blonde hair with a deep sigh before he gets back to work.

- - - - - - - - - -

Shelly Estry and her newest best friend, Lara from the fourth eastern floor, inking division, chatter together as they wait on Shelly's nonfat tiramisu latte. Lara grips her nonfat mocha with an extra shot and extra chocolate, her raspberry cream muffin perched on top, and watches Shelly with gleaming eyes. Even she knows the great honor involved in being the first person told a piece of gossip.

In fact, if it turns out to be as good as Shelly had promised on the messaging client, Lara may have cause to slip into the office of the accountant at the end of her fourth floor hall. All things are fair when one has a good piece of gossip. Lara figures this means that she can fudge the lines of his marriage by leaning over and telling him in her breathless sort of sexy voice that she's attempted to perfect during the daydreams she infiltrates her bedtime rituals with. Dinner with a glass of wine, dream of sexy married accountant (SMA); television, dream of SMA near to cuddle up to; read latest Steele book with cat on lap, pretend SMA's head is causing the warmth - thus, read aloud; lie down and dream of SMA taking some of Ms. Steele's ideas into his own head to do - practice Sexy Voice.

Nothing brings people together like a good juicy piece of gossip.

Besides, Shelly had said in their early morning messaging in between jobs, it would be nice to "stick it to those bitches down in the mail room, for once."

But now is not the time to talk about gossip. Instead, the two women chat about Lara's newest Nordstroms shopping trip and the purse she got there for five dollars off. It really was last season's model, but none of the old fuddyduddies on Fourth would know it.

Well, except for Ms. Plott. Only, she won't have cause to look at what Lara's carrying on the end of her arm. Ms. Seiara Plott is far more interested in keeping the married accountant on the fourth floor with her at nights and away from his wife. She can't be bothered to even care if Lara has gotten a new, out of season purse. A nice pair of shoes now, she might cattily drop a word or two about. But a purse? There was a man to reel in. Such things as purses were of no consequence.

Armed with their coffees, they sit out on the bench that sit just by the steps leading up to the Yuy building. The birches whisper their own secrets here.

Once settled, Lara leans forward, her eyes piranha bright and her lips parted to show off years of dental work. "So?" she asks, her voice trembling with eagerness.

Shelly shifts on her axis and bumps her knees against the side of the bench. She's been waiting for two hours now to tell this story and it's almost as if she can't help but wait a little longer, gloat over being the only one to know.

"So," she mimics Lara without meaning to. "Mr. Yuy had a meeting this morning. First thing. I came in and hadn't taken off my coat yet, before he comes up. And you know who it is?"

Lara shakes her head, being a faithful audience, not daring to talk and take them both off of the subject when the subject is so important and their coffee break so short.

"Duo. Maxwell." A gasp from Lara makes Shelly smile in triumph. "Or.. Mr. Maxwell, I'll _have_ to call him now." She sighs in sheer pleasure and her cheeks pink. "Yes, Duo Maxwell. He paced the front room and Mr. Yuy was fifteen minutes late." A decidedly evil look comes over her, wicked and mischievous. "You know what I think? I think that he knew Duo… Mr. Maxwell, that is, was coming and he wanted to make him sweat. It was on purpose."

"No!" Lara answers, faithful to the telling, knowing the best moment for dramatic emphasis. She's played this part before.

"Yes!" Shelly doesn't giggle. Rather, her eyes widen in happiness. "Anyway, Duo turns on him and oh, he didn't look happy! He just turns really cold and Mr. Yuy nods in this calm easy way. He's never late. He eyes Duo and as polite as you please, he opens the door and says, 'After you, Mr. Maxwell." I thought Duo was going to reach out and punch him! He mutters something really low and goes inside. Then Mr. Yuy tells me to hold all calls and he leads Duo into his office."

Lara gazes at her watch, concerned about how this seems to be more of a long term, over a good beer story, rather than the type you can slip into ears here and there.

"If you want to hear this, you'll have to take on a few extra minutes, Lara," Shelly sniffs. She sees nothing wrong with a bit of extra time taken for something important. Maybe she chose the wrong person to share this moment with.

Realizing that her role of being confidante is in severe jeopardy, Lara reaches for Shelly's hand and catches it in her own. "I have plenty of time for you, Shelly," she assures her friend smoothly and then giggles because giggling on the part of the audience is more than welcome. And in this case, it's the deciding factor for Shelly laughs and pats her hand.

"Well, I'm not an eavesdropper, but I certainly gave it a good shot. Unfortunately Mr. Yuy's doors are shut so I can't hear. I had a call come through then as well. It was some charity or something and the woman could yammer on. You'd have thought I was the person she had to talk to." Shelly gives a longsuffering look around her. "But then," and the glint has returned, Lara comes in close, "Mr. Chang comes by just as quick as can be. He wears a phone on his belt you see. And he's looking grim but he just enters. I lean over and Duo is sitting there, looking like he's been punched himself. Then the door closes and I tell that stupid woman from whatever stupid charity she's from, that she can just call back.

"I thought they were sacking him. Because a second later Mr. Chang is coming out of the door with his hand around Duo's arm, sort of looking like he's escorting Duo. I tried to give Duo a smile to let him know that things were probably going to be okay, only he didn't look at me. Duo wasn't saying anything, but he sure looked pissed." The two women giggle at this, the idea of saying a word like "pissed" when talking about a man while on a coffee break just too much to resist.

"Heero Yuy sacked Duo Maxwell," Lara's face is shocked as the full message seeps in. This _is_ good!

"No. This is the best part!" Shelly's mouth widens into an enormous smile. "Mr. Yuy calls me in just after. And he tells me, as calm as can be, to pick up the files on the floor," Lara's eyes widen at this, "and then after that, to please box up Mr. Maxwell's things and move them to the adjoining office. Mr. Chang's replacement, he says, will not be back until tomorrow morning."

Lara looks confused. "I thought Wufei Chang was his bodyguard."

Shelly rolls her eyes. "And his personal secretary."

This, indeed, is enormous news and Lara gives an obligatory cackle of glee. "Holy shit!" she whispers harshly. "Oh you lucky bitch! You're going to be working with Duo Maxwell!"

Which, of course, was the entire reason to be excited about the subject, aside from the fact the two have serious gossip which would be shared as soon as she returned. Duo Maxwell had landed the cushiest job in the company.

- - - - - - - - - -

It is a shame that Duo Maxwell did not share their sentiment. Sitting in the passenger seat of a black Mercedes, glaring out of the window and refusing to look at Chang, he really was not altogether happy about the position he had found himself.

The city is a blank to him - but it's just as attributable to the shock he is in, as it is to how he's lived his life up until now. He's seen it in many different aspects, in so many different perspectives, at such different times. A building is a building is a building, whether it's dilapidated or shining new. A road moves into another road, some with pitted holes in their middles, some with shining black asphalt, newly laid. And sifted throughout the main building blocks of the city, the various forms of life, ranging from the bums on the east corner to the pigeons that shit on every surface that tilts slightly horizontal, the falcons that eat the stinky birds and the perfectly coifed men and women driving cars that the cost of which alone could pay the grocery bill for one of those east side bums for three years.

He has, literally seen it all. At the moment, it's a simple backdrop to the drama his life has just become.

The night before, he'd gone to Ides Tower and commiserated with Sara Nesi over a pint of rootbeer. He could call it commiserating despite the fact that Sara had never had had troubles with a boss let alone had a job to lose in the first place. Still, it was better than commiserating with Dr. Paulsen, because Roger only manages to get dead drunk and Duo felt almost certain that despite his overwhelming desire to get plastered, it would help to have a clear mind come seven a.m.

Sara Nesi had leaned on her hand and pulled at her purple lipstick painted lower lip. One of her long pencil thin legs was hooked over the bar stool while the other, she rested her chin on. She was skinny like that. She could tuck her heel up to her ass and both would fit on the stool seat. Her face seemed pale against the black netting of her nylons. Duo could see, now and again, as she moved, that she had on pink panties. It reminded him of a small child because Sara had no idea she was showing off the outer rim of her panties while all she was attempting to do was get comfortable.

He didn't mention the panties to Sara. He wasn't sure what she'd say to that. But he did make a mental note to keep an eye out on Roger Paulsen when he was talking to Sara, because there was something almost wrong about the man sometimes. Not that Roger would do anything to Sara. No one was that stupid. It was just that Duo wasn't sure Roger wouldn't go home and with all of his psychological excuses, make it okay for himself to jack off to a slim sight of pink panties. The thought made Duo want to gag. Straight men were so gross.

"So Mr. Blue Eyes is gonna can you?" She sighed and pulled on her lower lip some more. The lipstick must have been the no smear shit because it didn't transfer at all to her fingertips. "And what'er you gonna do then, Duo?"

Duo shrugged and pulled his braid around his shoulder. He dipped the end of it into his rootbeer foam. He picked up the lion's tail like end, sucking at it and grinning at Sara's giggle. "Dunno," he said a moment after she'd taken a napkin and was drying off the damp tip. "I thought I'd work with Bernie for a while. Or I could go back to what I did before."

Sara raised a brow. She was too young to have been around on the streets when Duo did his "other job." But she's heard enough from him about it. And she's noticed the guys that Duo brings to the bar and how they all seem to know about this other thing Duo used to do. She didn't say anything. She just looked at him and then, when she noticed a pale jean jacket come in through the front door, she dropped her leg and tried to look older by resting a hand onto Duo's upper arm.

Duo grinned. "Nick?" he mouthed and grinned further at how Sara blushed. But Duo was a good guy and instead of making a deal about it, he just leaned in closer so that they can talk more intimately. "Okay, so I couldn't go back. But at the moment, I'm just fuckin' pissed. I mean, he sort of forced this anyway." He ground his teeth and looked down at his rootbeer.

"No," Sara murmured back, "you just needed a better fuck buddy."

Duo grimaced. "That's why I'm drinking with you. So you better not leave me for another fellow tonight."

Sara laughed and hugged him. But they both knew that if Nick Cherry ever realized how he should go for a good girl instead of the alien woman he'd dragged in that night, that all he'd have had to do was call and Duo would have been drinking alone.

Duo didn't hold it against Sara. He understood.

Understanding didn't help much in the morning, however. He'd lost himself in contemplation of a plate of eggs turning slightly more yellow with every moment they were left on his plate. Then he'd gotten up and finished preparing for work because his stomach was a ball of nerves and he couldn't have expected to have any appetite, even if it would have been good for him. Anything he'd have eaten would have been thrown up anyway.

He arrived at Mr. Yuy's office in time to see the secretary pulling her jacket off. She looked at him in surprise and her smile was delighted. He couldn't remember her name. Duo was wonderful at name recall so he figured that it was most likley due to his nervousness. If he had to wait very long this time, he may not know how to speak by the time Mr. Yuy invites him inside. But then, that didn't turn out to be a problem. Mr. Yuy hadn't even gotten to the office yet, the secretary assured him. Would he care to sit?

Duo paced. He couldn't sit. He smoothed the silk of his shirt and tucked his fingers into the back pocket of his jeans. He wanted to rock back and forth on his heels, only that would have seemed infantile.

It might have seemed to any outside observer that Duo Maxwell was a man aware of how his life hung in the balance. Maybe even that he was concerned about how this meeting might turn out. But the truth was an oddity Duo didn't see fit to divulge to general public. That he wasn't concerned about his job might have struck many who had the sensibilities of Matthew June as surprising enough. To go into detail on just what he was concerned about would have done more than just surprise them all.

Duo was too good at hiding. He had had no intentions of letting any cats out of any bags. It bothered him that Mr. Yuy sat in his office, waving a hand and finding out all of Duo's cats without breaking a sweat. Duo sweat plenty trying to bury the stupid things. He didn't want to think that they'd be so easily found.

He had said no to a cup of coffee, checked his watch against the clock to make sure it was on time, checked his watch again to see how much time had passed, debated on leaving a note, debated on remaining and giving the infernal stuck up prig a piece of his mind about making him wait again, debated on remaining and doing other things that might have shocked the secretary enough and Duo as well, that he might have gotten her name just from Mr. Yuy's groan of "Mrs. Whatever, do shut the door." Hell, he had gone over every eventuality ranging from the pair of them going to get a beer together, to Duo getting shoved out of the window by Mr. Chang before having his last dirty secrets put out in a office memo. He was crafting said memo actually, when the elevator dinged and Mr. Yuy stepped out of it.

Duo had the sense that somehow, the bird of prey look he'd noticed before was turned to something resembling a hound, crouched over a fallen fox. He shivered. Then he focused his attention on the man's nose, wondered if there were any blemishes on the man's skin and if he covered them up in order to seem more perfect, felt disdain for someone who'd be so vain as to cover up what made him human, and in the disdain, discovered that he could actually still be pissed off. Actually, going into a meeting while feeling pissed off, where someone would kindly tell you, in as many words as they could cushion the message in, that one was fired, was somewhat of a relief. The last thing Duo could afford to feel was worried or scared or anything worse.

Not being as schooled as the coldness of the man, Duo knew his pride and anger were somewhat visible. Nevertheless, Mr. Yuy didn't seem to find it in himself to address the obvious upset. Rather, he went to his door and opened it. The dark mahogany swung open with a smooth sound of silence. Probably brand new, Duo thought with disgust.

"After you, Mr. Maxwell," the man managed to open the door to his office like he was ushering in an important client.

Duo took a deep breath, then let it out sharply at the first scent of something cool and minty, recognizing it as a new smell and therefore, belonging to Mr. Yuy. Fear rose into him, unbidden and unreasonable. "It won't take that long," he muttered more to himself than anyone as he passed ahead, forcing his mask to take its place once more. Anger was a good enough mask, but sometimes even anger wouldn't serve.

A soft murmur of "hold my calls," reminded Duo he had missed the secretary's name once again, but he ignored it. He wouldn't need her name as it was. Not after that morning.

As the door clicked closed with the preternatural suavity that only a door can manage in a high office like this one, Mr. Yuy's voice offered a chair and the man smoothly made his way to the other side of the office. There, while Duo watched, he drew his silk scarf off and looped it over a small hook. His hat and overcoat followed. The man would not mean to, but he'd make everything seem like business, even undressing. Hell, sex was more than likely a tab A/slot B affair.

Duo's mouth went dry and he looked away, out the windows behind the desk, and into the mayhem and normality of the city beyond.

"I'll stand, thank you," he realized he had missed a step in the dance they were conducting. But he was busy trying to consider the ramifications of simply stating his purpose now, or waiting for the final blow. If he was fired, or laid off, wouldn't it give him cause to use unemployment? But then, how would it affect his employment opportunities later?

Screw it. Matthew was bound to write a glowing recommendation. And it wasn't as if he had worked with the new Mr. Yuy anyway. The man could say nothing.

His thoughts, however, were derailed as the blue eyes turned darker and with no change of modulation in his voice, Mr. Yuy conveyed a full detail of torment and hardship possible to anyone declinging his request in a repeat of, "Take a seat, Mr. Maxwell."

Duo, to his amazement, found he was sitting down. He looked at Mr. Yuy with surprise barely hidden under the fragile mask on his face.

Finally in control, apparently, Mr. Yuy settled onto a small, professional smile. "Now then," he folded his hands and sat back into his chair behind the dark power desk. "I understand you've been ill, Mr. Maxwell."

Duo did a quick scurry in his brain and headed off the snort of disgust before it made it out his nose. Instead, he remained still, confused as to why he wasn't just standing up and leaving.

Mr. Yuy obviously took that as a means to continue as he leaned forward on his elbows, weaving his fingers together before him, thumbs pointing to the ceiling. "Let me be frank, Mr. Maxwell. I am certain that is, in the end, the only way to be."

"Of course," Duo's throat opened up enough to let out the two words, then slammed shut again and wouldn't let him breathe.

"I have a great interest in my company. I have a great interest, actually, in making certain my company is the best." Mr. Yuy's fingers remained still, but his eyebrows shot up with the expression of a man about to close a very advantageous deal. "I do not deal with men in my business who cannot give me results. Neither do I deal with men who are of a half and half morality. I choose, Mr. Maxwell, to keep my contacts, all of them you see, limited to those I know I can trust to do as well for me as I will do for them."

Duo Maxwell wondered if Mr. Yuy had written this all out before and practiced it during the night. Hell, he didn't even have cue cards. Duo wasn't sure he could pull off a speech like this without cue cards.

"Now, I realize that no company is perfect. There will be men and women who make errors, use too much paper, steal office supplies, even steal products or ideas at times. But as we are in the security business, I find it almost necessary to ensure that my business is filled with those whom I feel have a greater degree of good character and strength of will than those we serve. No more important is that, then in those I keep in the upper management, Mr. Maxwell. Those whom I depend on to do what no one else can do."

Those eyebrows really had a lot to say.But Duo Maxwell wasn't sure he could understand them without a decoder ring.

Leaning back in his chair, Duo folded his hands, one over the other, and placed them on his knee. His braid curled up behind him and nudged the back of his neck. It wasn't as silken when shortened ends were sticking out and into his skin. The prickle distracted him and he strove, in his own way, to discern just how long it was going to take Mr. Yuy to get to the point. Then, deciding it didn't matter how long it took Mr. Yuy to get to the point, Duo rose his chin and with an arch tilt to his head, hissed, "Mr. Yuy, I think we all know that the folder you had on your desk the other day has more incriminating evidence than you need to fire me. The mere fact that I'm a drunk would be more than enough."

The dark haired man lifted a brow. Duo wondered if there was a flag journal, like they make for the guys who direct airport traffic. Only this book would describe what left up, right down, meant.

"The folder," Mr. Yuy's eyebrow danced higher. "You have concerns about the contents?"

Duo sighed. "Are you waiting for me to quit? It would make it easier on you, I'm sure. Maybe me too."

"Quit, Mr. Maxwell?" How could the man have managed to look so at ease and yet so completely shocked? It was a cerebral shock though, there was no emotion visible anywhere, even in the man's infernal eyebrows.

"Mr. Yuy," Duo looked down a path he hadn't realized he'd chosen until then," how about I make this easier on us both. I quit." He stood. "Good day." And he almost laughed. He sounded like Matthew.

He wasn't sure what he was waiting for. But the lack of response shouldn't have surprised him. Duo made as if to go.

"Do sit down, Mr. Maxwell," the smooth voice ordered and Duo railed in anger at his body as it obeyed the voice and not him.

Once seated, Mr. Yuy leveled a gaze at the longer haired man. "I am not in the habit of firing men whom are irreplaceable, Mr. Maxwell."

Duo frowned. He could hear a niggling little "but" in there somewhere.

"However," Oh.. so it was a however, not a but - whoop dee doo-, "you have stated a point which cannot be swept under the carpet. Your alcoholism is a rather difficult problem for me, Mr. Maxwell."

Never before had Duo wanted to strangle someone for using his last name so damn often. It was a power trip some of the big wigs used. They both wanted to be sure they didn't forget your name, whilst at the same time, wanted it plain that they were in charge of the situation. There was nothing like the particular use of one's name to put one in one's place.

"Is it?" Duo asked, sarcasm lacing the question.

"Yes, it certainly is. You see, I cannot afford to let you go to another company. Not, I assure you, because I fear for any company secrets. I am positive that you are above such petty acts of disgruntlement. Rather, it is due to the fact that you, as you are, are far more important to the company than many of my other employees. I cannot afford to lose you, Mr. Maxwell. Not to another company, not to illness or death, not even to something as insidious as Ides Tavern."

The hair on the back of Duo's neck rose to tangle with the strands from his braid. "You aren't the one to make that choice," he said as sternly as he could. Somehow, the severity of his voice lilted and proved itself to be nothing but a small humm in the other man's ear.

"Therefore, I have decided that I will simply have to keep you out of Ide's Tavern, and sober as well."

Voices screamed in Duo's head. "I have a new job," he said as calmly as he was able.

"Of course," Mr. Yuy nodded, this making perfect sense to him which made no sense at all to Duo. "And you will begin to work today. Of course, I realize that your pay cannot afford the change in station you will have to undergo. The apartment alone will be almost impossible to cover. Therefore we will work out changes to your salary effective immediately as well."

Duo wasn't sure if he'd been obvious enough. "I quit," he tried.

Mr. Yuy seemed to think this was in line with Everything Else. And Everything Else was to be ignored. "Wufei will come by and help you move out of your apartment. I've directed him to engage a moving company to take all of your things and set them into a storage space. You may go through that later, perhaps."

Duo stared. "You can't do this," he whispered and sensed, somehow, that it wouldn't make any difference.

"Mr. Maxwell," the deep blue eyes seemed to be enjoying this far too much and at Duo's expense. "I have a folder of information which would make it almost impossible for you to ever have a job in this town again. Do not press me."

Of course, not having known Duo long, Mr. Yuy could not have known how that kind of statement was the worst thing anyone could say to Duo Maxwell. With his hands tightened and flat against his thighs, wanting desperately to go to fists, Duo stood slow and steadily. He loosened his jaw so as to speak in a normal tone.

"Mr. Yuy, I do not see any reason to continue working with you. If you think that I will remain because you want to throw some of my dirty laundry about, believe me, I have suffered far worse. Losing position in this world of yours holds far less fear for me than it would for someone like you." Duo attributed his eloquence fully on his overwhelming rage. "I. Quit."

Rage welled up in him and Duo growled in response. In a fit of infantile anger, an inbox near his hand went flying as he swept his hands out in an arc. "Dammit! Don't you get it? I won't work for you. I wouldn't work for you if you paid me triple what you do now!"

Heero Yuy did not rise from his seat. He merely lifted the other brow this time and stared at Duo. The stare alone had the power to undermine the courage of the most strong willed man. Duo, finding nothing to hide behind, felt himself deflate. Shame overwhelmed him. He fought it. "You can't do this," he repeated himself and hated how his ability to use words effectively had simply fled because of a stare down with a spoiled rich boy who wasn't getting his way.

But then, Mr. Yuy had something most spoiled rich boys didn't have. He had those damnable eyes.

"If it is for the good of my company, Mr. Maxwell, you will find there are few things I cannot do." It seemed like such a logical argument. More so, with the smooth man saying it. He'd won and he was merely tying up the last of the deal.

The door opened behind him. Duo looked over his shoulder and caught sight of the secretary (what the hell was her name?) leaning into the space to see what she could. Great, this would be in every ear before lunch time.

Then, he gazed up the white suit that closed the door and met onyx eyes.

"Ah, Wufei," Mr. Yuy made it sound as if he were relieved in the most suave of ways. "Mr. Maxwell has chosen to be somewhat resistant to our idea. But I am sure you can convince him otherwise."

Duo gasped. The man in the white suit looked like he could have convinced Hitler to give up persecuting the Jews. He felt a shiver slip soundlessly under his skin, freezing him from the end of his nose down to his knees. His toes flexed and he was sure his hair could have moved as well, but other than that, and a blink of his eyes, he wasn't able to do much else.

Well, maybe he could. "You … can't do this," he managed hoarsely and inwardly cringed at his lack of intelligence in his arguments.

"Can't?" Mr. Yuy's eyes were definitely laughing at him now. "Mr. Maxwell, I have just offered you a far better paying job, a position wherein you can continue to do well for my company as well as making yourself a well stocked resume for later should you choose to change companies, and a chance to, how shall I say it, get clean? You are telling me you don't want this?"

Duo knew he wasn't doing a very good job at all of hiding his surprise, nor his shame. "I…well, no.. I mean… No, it's not that! I would want all of that. But you can't just… just walk in here and tell me what you're going to do with my life. It is my life, you know." He was sounding more and more stupid with every moment that passed. It made it sound like he really wasn't in charge of his life. He suddenly felt like a child complaining against their parent.

"No one is keeping you here, Mr. Maxwell," Mr. Yuy assured him in a blatant lie. There was a hand on Duo's shoulder, light and insistent. He was fairly certain that should he have tried to stand, it would have held him down. And if that weren't enough, there was the fact that any of his reasons for leaving would probably have been crushed under the smooth wall of the indomitable Mr. Yuy's cool.

Weakness fluttered up and Duo couldn't find a single one of those words he'd used so artfully only moments before.

"Wufei will explain to you the job. He's been waiting for someone to come along who could manage it as skillfully as he has over the past years. I am certain he is delighted that you've accepted this. It will allow you and Sally to have a honeymoon, is that not right, Wufei?"

Wufei Chang gave a small grunt over Duo's head. Just a bit above. Just a bit behind. Duo couldn't be bothered to turn his head.

As if the conversation were well over, Mr. Yuy leaned back in his chair and looked at his watch. "Well then, I have a meeting in fifteen minutes which I'd like to prepare for. Wufei, if you'd be so kind as to help Duo settle into his quarters. Also feel free to take him to the storage space so that he might choose what he wishes to take with him to the apartment. Thank you, Mr. Maxwell. I look forward to working with you."

Somehow, the man had managed to stand and walk around the desk, because his hand was held out before Duo and there was the clean, buffed signs of a recent manicure on the slightly golden skin with the pink nails at each tip. Duo didn't take the hand. Instead, he attempted to slip out from under the demand. He rose to one side, bypassing the hand which, thankfully, withdrew so that he didn't have to brush past.

Shock couldn't begin to explain away how he'd ended up accepting this. He wasn't even sure if he had. He knew only that walking out of the office, he was rising to a slow boil and had been, ever since.

Oh, and that the secretary's name was Estry. Mr. Yuy had said it as Wufei escorted Duo out the door. He'd said, "Ms. Estry, please send me in the Hawkins report," with a tinny voice coming over the small speaker on her desk. Somehow, even modulated and changed, the voice retained the order to it which made Duo understand just why Ms. Estry leapt from her chair and hurried quickly down the hall toward what he could only suppose was a records room.

He felt sorry for her. Because he knew now, just how compelling that voice could be.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The car rolling to a halt draws Duo out of his painful memories. He looks through the window up at the highrise apartment complex. A glaring sign outside of it announces that this is the "Yuy Corp. Apartments" in a direct, uncaring attitude of silver on black. A waterfall slides down from underneath one corner of the apartments and curls around the side of the building in a long, rambling stream, ending finally in a fish pond at the front. A small japanese ornamental bridge spans the pond, a single blotch of red in a world of dark greens and soil and rocks and miniature iron cranes, half poised for flight.

Duo steps out of the car, half afraid that Wufei will come around and take his arm again. A little willingness never hurt sacrificial lambs. Not any more than they'd be hurt in the end, that is.

Following Chang up the steps, Duo glances around himself more, noting the small flower plot along the far side, tucked in against the foot of the building by the stream, and trying its best to add fading color to the autumnal scene. And ahead, there is a doorman at the top of the stairs. Duo felt, despite silk shirt, that he is a little too shabby, too common for this place. Still, there is only a "Mr. Chang" from the doorman and the door opens immediately.

Suddenly, the city changes. No longer is it dully lit. Rather, it harbors evil and eyes and darkness everywhere. Heads turn and gaze. Here is the enemy, those who know they own the world, guide it, direct it, and create it to suit their fancy.

Duo steps into the apartment building, not surprised in the least that the bottom floor is a lobby of sorts, with marble flooring and large pots filled with greenery. He brushes his hand along the rim of one, letting leaves fold over the back of his hand, and is surprised to find that there is earth inside the bowl. So they aren't fake. Yet they're well tended.

They pass a guard at the base who sits before a set of three elevators. The man looks up and smiles. "Hello Mr. Chang. Mrs. Chang-Po is in your suite, sir. She directed me to let you know if you came in."

Wufei nods curtly and to Duo's amazement, even manages a "thank you" before the elevator door closed.

Normally, Duo would have been filling the silence with his voice. Normally he'd have been complaining about Yuy's dealings with him, he'd have called the man all sorts of terrible names, and maybe he'd have been making appreciative comments about the building. But that was when Duo was nervous or afraid or worried or happy or sad or excited or… anything but angry enough to pop. With anger came silence. And Duo is unwilling to say a single word, fearful of where it might take things. The insides of a car or an elevator were not quite the safest places to let things get out of hand when his companion looks as if he could break Duo in half by a simple old fashioned karate chop.

A card slides into a slot alongside the numbers and then a key slipping in to the silver lock with the uppermost number at the top, puts everything into perspective. Duo manages not to be too overwhelmed when the elevator comes to a halt and the doors slide open to reveal a mansion.

There is no hallway here. The elevator sits in the center of the penthouse, flanked on all sides by chairs or plants or rugs or, in one case, a half size bookshelf. Duo allows himself the opportunity to gape.

The foyer, for that is what it is, branches off on all sides, leading into the apartment across a green marble floor. Along the walls, on both sides, fountains ease water through copper leaves, over copper flowers, and into large basins from which grow green ferns. The soft sound of tinkling water into green patina copper fills the silence.

Duo swallows. All of this? But he isn't sure if he should speak. Now that they've managed to remain silent so long, he hasn't set up a precedent, really.

Three doors sit, two across from one another, close to the elevator, and a third at the end of the foyer. They remain closed and Wufei walks to the one at the right. A key again jingles and the door, previously locked, swings open.

Wufei watches Duo as the young man slips into the room beyond like a newly introduced kitten. His eyes wide, he stalks along the insides, keeping to the walls without seeming to. It adds a new dimension to the other man that Wufei will have to consider.

Unwilling to agree with what Heero has chosen, yet likewise loathe to give up his opportunity to have time with his wife, Wufei has done this only under gentle protest. He could not begin to say that he understood. Heero has a penchant for taking what he's seen others do and try to do them one better. That is the only way that Wufei can reason out this latest project. Not that he also can't see the possiblity for success. Yes, Duo Maxwell is a man well attuned to what is best for any situation. The man was nothing less than a great loss should Heero have allowed him to get away.

But then, Heero didn't have the reasons for keeping Duo that the other man who had tried this, had. That presented its own set of problems. Only Heero wouldn't have listened anyway. Heero was as stubborn as a bear and just as stupid at times. Wufei had given up.

Wufei Chang lets the door close behind him. "The penthouse has been split into three apartments which can be used in tandem or seperately," he says and calmly ignores the skittish leap the other man gives. Likewise, he doesn't attend to the hasty brushing down of shirt the man has been doing now and again since they entered the building. Wufei can empathize. He'd felt like he didn't belong either the first time he'd come here.

Then again, he hadn't been from money like the rest of these men were.

"This is your apartments for now. This is the main living space," he beckons to the large room the door has led into. Along one wall, an entertainment system sits, a selection of cds and dvds and books in a wooden rack along the wall. The room is furnished with light greys, greens, silvers, and coppers, much like a good deal of the penthouse is. A large leather couch set sits just before the three step rise in the floor that leads to an office setting at the far end of the apartments. There, a computer desk and filing drawers look out from the side, through large ceiling high windows. "Beyond, will be your work space. You will find," he intones blandly as he walks to where the steps dance upwards, "that there is a paneling to be used as a wall here which you can utilize if you find it necessary to separate yourself from work."

Sally felt it very necessary. She had closed the panels completely. She did not wish to have his work spill into his personal life and she made a good deal out of the business of leaving work behind when she was home.

Duo's careful stepping up, looking down in awe at the plush carpet of the office and the gleam in his eyes make Wufei sure that he isn't the only boy from a poor background. He isn't the only one who has never seen this kind of opulence so carefully displayed.

"And this door?" Duo asks, touching a door alongside the computer desk. "Like a personal bathroom and kitchen for my small needs?" he smirks. Something is rising inside of him, Wufei can tell. Something is coming to light.

Wufei shakes his head. "No, that is the door leading to Mr. Yuy's office. As a key part of his team, you'll be expected to be on call, for whenever he has need of you." It is a lie. Wufei isn't on call. But Heero needs to be able to check on Duo no matter the hour. That was part of the plan, apparently.

Watching Duo's back stiffen, Wufei senses that Heero may have bitten off more than he's capable of taking care of this time.

"Ah…" Duo's smirk turned deadly. "so I guess that means that this door is going to remain unlocked, huh?"

"Yes."

"Hunh," Duo snips out of the corner of his mouth as he chews on the inside of his cheek and looks at the closed door with something rather akin to dangerous and mischievous glee. "Kay," he turns on the balls of his feet and grins, wildly. Things obviously were sinking in finally. "So, what else, Feifei?"

Wufei, with a slight frown at how quickly his name has been twisted out of recognition, steps down and leads across the main living space. "You have a bedroom toward the back. But first, your eating rooms have been changed to an exercise room in this case. Though you do have a small kitchen as well, all meals will be taken with Mr. Yuy. This might be business meals where you will be required to take notes and organize functions, but also includes meals here as well. You will find your work day begins around five a.m. and continues until Mr. Yuy feels it is time to sleep. I will warn you," he adds, "Mr. Yuy doesn't need much rest."

Duo laughs derisively. "Well, too bad. I like to sleep."

Wufei doesn't look back. Already the first battle has been set into the sand. Instead, he continues down the hallway. "The den is your personal place. You may wish to change things as you see fit. Here is where you might choose to bring in some of your personal effects, those which you don't put into your bedroom. I heard there was plenty of furniture and such that the men had mentioned moving from your apartment, but this apartment is furnished."

"Burnie was there? Didn't he tell them that I'd left that shit to him? How much shit did they take?"

Wufei glanced around as he turned on a light, "Bathroom is here. Shower, jetted tub near the window, and this is the second room, not counting Mr. Yuy's sun room, that has sky lights. And I am unsure what they took. If they were wrong in anything, you can instruct me later when we go to the storage space. We will redeliver anything taken that was not yours."

"Damn straight. Hey, so this place. You got one of these too?"

"We do."

"Woah… nice tub… you know, this makes this almost worthwhile. I might have to take a bath right away. Not bad!" Duo runs his hands along the edge of the tub. "We got enough hot water to fill this?"

"You have three large capacity hot water heaters, Mr. Maxwell," Wufei assures him.

"Ah hell, call me Duo," Duo smiles. "Yer not a fuckin' butler are you?"

Wufei manages not to snort in disgust. "And through this door, you will find your sleeping room," he says as he opens a door leading from the large bathroom.

Duo crows in delight as he walks into the room. Obviously no longer upset by the arrangement, Duo runs for the bed. "Holy shit!" he cries out as he leaps upon it. Kingsized, covered in a black coverlet, backed up against a window that faces out to the city, the bed dances with the result of his landing upon it and then instantly leaping up. Duo flips and falls onto his back, a huge smile on his face. "Woah.. serious jumping power," he grins as he turns onto his stomach and looks around. Suddenly childlike, Duo seems far less innocent than Wufei's findings had made him out to be. It is … surprising, really. For all that Duo seems to have done, he still retains something of a prepubescent boy in his face and the way he's approaching all of this.

"Hey, Feifei?" Duo asks, leaning his chin on his hand and staring at Wufei.

"Hn."

Taking this as permission, Duo sits up. "How far back did Mr. Yuy go when he did all of that research on me. I mean, you know everything right?"

Wufei nods. "I am the one who looked everything up," he states. He knows he's not proud of delving into another man's past and withdrawing all of the wrong moments for the world to see. But neither is he cowardly enough to pretend he had had nothing to do with it.

"Oh," Duo looks crestfallen a moment and then smiles. "So? How far back?"

Wufei considers this. It is Duo's information, but he's not sure how much he should tell. By virtue of his job, which he still, technically has, he is not yet in a position to divulge everything.

And yet, watching Duo, Wufei recognizes a desire in himself to reach out and somehow touch upon this young man. There is a brightness about Duo which Wufei hadn't expected from his results of compiling that file. It is a brightness that transforms all around it, into moths.

"Four years, Mr. Maxwell."

"Toldja, you can call me Duo, Fei," Duo grinned.

"Hn."

"You're a real smooth talker. What's your wife's name? I'll bet she wants to strangle you sometimes. Sally, right? Does she know that communication isn't your strong point?" And Duo is smiling in feral delight. He is pleased and he obviously doesn't mind Wufei knowing it.

Wufei flushes slightly and grits his teeth. "I'd ask that you keep my wife out of this, Maxwell," he says calmly.

Duo stretches, plainly pleased. "Maxwell's not so bad. And I'll keep her out of this until I meet her," he grins and dances up and across the room before Wufei is even aware that he's taken a step forward, raised his hands, wanting to make a more permanent impression of his wife being off limits upon the handsome slender whirlwind. "Then! She's fair game," he snickers.

No matter what suit the other man puts on, he cannot hide the fact he is hiding a devil underneath.

"Devil by the tail," Wufei sniffs and looks out the window of the bedroom, seeing the city from the other side.

"So where's the other shit you're supposed to have in a pent house? Where's the pool and the tennis courts and all that?"

"The pool is one floor down, as are the raquet ball courts and the building exercise room. These are open to any with the passcode to get into them."

Duo snickers. "And I was just joking. And the servants? Y'know, my maid and shit?"

"Servant working rooms, this includes the cleaning cupboards and the kitchen, are all at the far western end of the building. You can reach them, if you'd like, by indicating that the elevator open to the back, rather the front."

"Is this the only elevator that comes up this high? There were three," Duo tucks his hands into his jeans and comes to stand by Wufei, his sudden intent calm so focused that Wufei feels like anything and everything he's been saying will be placed into some strange and foreign compartment in Duo Maxwell's head and there, never be forgot.

"There are three, yes. But the other two stop at the floor below us." Wufei stands and moves back through the room. "Please feel free to make yourself comfortable. I will return in an hour and get you. We can go to the storage facility to decide what you wish to bring back."

Feeling this is enough to say, Wufei draws out of the room and is almost to the door when Duo's voice stops him. "Fei?"

Taking a deep breath, Wufei turns. "It is Wufei Chang. Or Chang, which ever you happen to prefer. And yes?"

"Do I get a key?"

Wufei stares at Duo and wonders just how to respond.

"No."

"Not even a key to get up here? Or one for my door? Or one for Mr. Yuy's place? Or any of that?"

"No. Not even that."

"Then.. how in hell am I expected to get here? How am I going to do anything?" Duo stares at him, incredulous.

"I suggest you take that up with Mr. Yuy." Wufei can't be the one to describe the cage to this free spirited man. Suddenly terrified of what questions might follow, he flees.

* * *

((_Well, chapter three. My goodness, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to pick it back up again. (Can't tell you how many times I've written and rewritten this chapter! I lost count after five.) Thank you all for the patience while I was thick in the midst of trying to find a good way to continue. It's good to be back and wrestling this gregarious group of characters back into boxes that seem to fit them somewhat.  
I will be completely honest. I want to assure that this fiction is not dropped. It is merely sitting, percolating between chapters. ;; And good news! I already know where chapter four is going! J yay! _

_**Those Amazing Reviewers** aka - those who make writing worthwhile:_

_Dyna: Oh dear.. and this wasn't quickly gotten to at all! I knew this would be on the back burner, but a year going by is so back burner I'm not even sure it can be considered the stove top any longer! Needless to say, I'm glad you've enjoyed it so far and I hope, as do you, that it turns out happy too!  
Crimson Release: Eh heh Eh heh… well, not so soon, I think. Still, I can't say how nice it is to have you reading! Thank you! You're doing the cut and copy thing! Woah.. that's a huge compliment!  
Ien: More! You bet! There's more!  
Tara SylvanBlade: Thank you so very much. I'm so glad you are enjoying it!  
BlackX: Hopefully more trouble will appear. We like trouble. As Ruby (if anyone knows of her and all) says "Oohh, the writer. They create characters just so they can knock them off" Hee hee. Can't have a happy ending without some serious striving to prove they deserve it, right?  
Kichiko: Where I'm going with it? Me too! Hopefully one of us will figure out what's going on! For now, I think Duo's in charge and he's being uncharacteristically mum about the whole affair.  
Kcgal: Ooo! You caught that! The mail room set-up. I'm soo sooo glad! I've been trying a different way of going about things. A different point of view. Not sure how long I can pull it off, but two chapters of this length and your recognition has to count for something!  
Rai: Hee hee… well, you're amazing anyway. Which is why everyone must bow down to you and feed you chocolate or some type of derivative form thereof. Pay her people!  
Ichigo Pocky: Another lovely name I recognize and grin at seeing! Isn't that funny? How chapters can just slip past you? Sometimes it's completely on purpose - but most of the time, I find I miss chapters just because I have too many other things going on and then suddenly it's "Oh wait… wasn't there… four chapters, not five last time I read this? Grah! I'm BEHIND!" Hee hee. I'm glad you're enjoying it, very glad. Thank you so much for reading!  
Tri-dear: You do know how much I care for your opinion. Thank you SOOOO much! The present/past tense thing is driving me nuts, but you would know better than most if I pulled it off or not, so my work must be paying off. Whew! What a relief! Thank you!  
crazy-lil-nae-nae: I so love that name. Hee hee. Thank you! Wow.. There are some compliments which just make you beam. And this one definitely did. Yay! I'm glad folks are ignoring the "don't feed the author" sign! ;;  
kazapochi: I allow sinking teeth into the writing. Just so long's you watch out for my fingers. Hee hee. Glad you're enjoying this! I'm sure loving writing it! I get to actually giggle during the process, that's neat. ))_


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